


Delusional

by MagicalStardust



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: After episode 1x22, Bit of torture and violence but T rated, F/M, Hydra (Marvel), Hydra is evil, Redemption, So it's probably fine, but Fitz is Awesome
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-24
Updated: 2014-11-21
Packaged: 2018-02-10 05:47:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 23,963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2013366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagicalStardust/pseuds/MagicalStardust
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The team have given up on Ward and Skye has resigned herself to the fact that Ward never loved her, however after being captured by what remains of Hydra, Fitz begins to question their beliefs, is Ward truly so evil?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Ambush

**Author's Note:**

> So I wrote this on Fanfiction.net under the name StardustOwl, however it is probably easier to read on here as I was a bit of an idiot and didn't realise you couldn't double space things, so scene changes are confusing there, also there are less errors here.

 

"Fitz get down!" Coulson yelled and May leapt towards the young scientist, throwing him towards the ground before Hydra's version of the night-night gun could hit him. _At least they want him alive,_ Coulson thought begrudgingly as he swung round to shoot the person who had tried to incapacitate Fitz.

Fitz groaned and looked up to see Jemma offering him a hand, he hadn't yet fully recovered from his time in the ocean but had demanded the team let him take part in this mission. As he got to his feet he put a hand to his forehead, leaning on Jemma and waiting for his head to stop spinning.

"Coulson face it!" Simmons yelled. "Ward's not here, it was an ambush!"

"Simmons is right," Skye agreed. "He set it up and let  _these agents,_ " she emphasised her words by disarming a Hydra agent and knocking him out – coincidentally both moves that Ward had taught her. "Do his dirty work while he hid behind the scenes like a coward,"

"I doubt he had anything to do with this, that's not his style," argued Coulson, kicking a guy in the head, elbowing another in the face and shooting the third with an I.C.E.R.

"Yeah, well what is his style?" Skye pointed out. "The man played us all Coulson, how do we know who he really is?"

Suddenly the doors slammed and a pinkish greenish gas came pouring through the vents. ("That's why crawling through them is always such a bad idea," Fitz informed them as he gazed curiously at the possibly deadly concoction.)

"The DWARFs say it's mainly comprised of methyl propyl ether," Simmons hurriedly told them.

"Sleeping gas," Coulson muttered darkly.

"Trip do you have any air filters in your grandfather's gadgets?" Fitz asked frantically to the person who was effectively Ward's replacement. Triplet shook his head, which did not earn him any favour points from the Scot; even though Simmons and Fitz had been on their first date – undercover at a science convention, but that counts right? – a few nights ago, he still felt jealous and yes, Ward was Hydra, but he still hated the thought of someone replacing the man he had thought of as a friend.

Whatever the others said he was certain that Garret had brainwashed Ward.

"Hold your breath for as long as you can!" Coulson ordered, trying to force open the doors as everyone else helped to search for an alternative exit.

May rolled her eyes.  _I thought that goes without saying?_ She mused.

However, whatever they tried the gas continued to unrelentingly pour in and after five minutes, even Coulson was sound asleep on the floor.

 

 

He opened his eyes and looked around, scanning the room for possible escape routes, two men in front, two behind, one to each side and presumably at least four outside.

"Ah Ward, you're awake," a Hydra agents stated the obvious and Ward raised an eyebrow, reopening a cut on his forehead, he didn't wince as the small stream of blood ran down his already bruised and blood-stained face.

The agent smirked. "Are you ready for another session?" he asked.

"Are you?" Ward shot back, this was nothing, he could deal with this, Garret had trained him to deal with much worse.

"I'm looking forward to it," the agent told the ex-spy sadistically and Ward cursed himself for being so careless, he'd thought he was off the grid, but, apparently not. "Did you think, Ward, that after you'd escaped what was left of SHIELD, that Hydra wouldn't come looking for you? You have information about the drug that we need,"

"That drug turns people crazy, if you think I'm going to tell you anything about that, you're wrong!" Ward told he agent clearly and calmly.

"Then think of this as a punishment for your betrayal and failure," he said, punching Ward in the face. There wasn't really much Ward could do seeing as he was very securely tied to a chair, but he hated the feeling of not being control, not being able to do anything, it reminded him of when his brother used to beat him and his younger brother up and he could do nothing to stop it. He just had to sit there and deal with it as all the agents in the room took it in turns to beat him. Well, not much until one decided to get creative and stuck a knife into his shoulder. Ward gazed up at the man through bruised eyelids and smirked, Melinda May told great stories.

 

 

Fitz groaned as he slowly came into consciousness, his head ached and he was pretty sure he was handcuffed to a cold metal chair.

"Finally," a woman exclaimed. "We were worried that the gas was having side effects,"

"Yeah, well, where's Jemma, and what's Ward up to, what happened to the rest of the team?" he demanded.

"They're safe," the woman told him patronisingly. "Though of course their continued well-being depends on you,"

"Save the clichés" Fitz said angrily. "What do you want?"

"You to build some of these," she held up the plans for some very complicated weapon. "Unfortunately we don't know many alive people able to build this and Ward was perfect bait,"

"When you say bait, what exac-"

"Don't try to screw us over, or your friends will end up like this," she threatened whilst emptying a box of warped metal pieces onto the table.

"The DWARFs!" Fitz yelled in sadness and horror.

"Your choice," she grinned evilly and walked towards the door.

"You know the same sort of thing happened to Tony Stark," Fitz told her as she opened the door and closed it behind her, the lock clicking into place. "I distinctly remember that not ending well!" he shouted as she stalked off down the corridor.

Suddenly there was a quiet scraping of metal above him and Grant Ward landed softly on the table, jumping down onto the floor and beginning to un-cuff the bewildered Fitz.

"We need to get out of here," he explained. "Do  _exactly_  as I say,"

"Ward…what are you doing here?" Fitz asked, as Ward began disabling the lock on the door. "And what the  _hell_  happened to you,"

Ward glanced at his aghast face before shrugging casually (pretending that that action wasn't agony) and replying coolly. "That doesn't matter right now, all that matters is that you, and Skye, and the rest of the team get out of here,"

He gave up trying to figure out the lock and kicked down the door, internally wincing at the pain that action brought him, before stepping out into the corridor and gesturing for Fitz (who did not look happy about Ward's answer) to follow him.

"Why did you chuck us in the ocean?" questioned Fitz after about ten seconds of silence.

"Well, it was between putting you in a metal box that floated, where you'd be safe, or shooting you, so…" Ward said sarcastically, indicating that it was hardly a difficult choice.

"It didn't float," Fitz said and Ward's eyes would have showed remorse if he hadn't been trained to show no emotion; like Skye had said, he was a robot. "Did you know that before you nearly killed Jemma?"

Voices came from round the corner and Ward pressed a finger to his lips

 

Meanwhile…

"Where are we?" Simmons asked, bleary eyed.

"Rise and shine, sleepy-head," Skye greeted. "We're in a box."

The scientist groaned and looked at the distasteful metal walls set about four meters apart which formed their square cell.

"Where's Fitz?" she questioned frantically.

"Finding him will be our first priority when we get out of here," explained Coulson calmly.

"In five, four, three, two," Skye counted down and the door slid open.

"Well that was quick!" Simmons said brightly.

"We're been in here for over two hours," May told her.

 

 

"That's May!" Fitz exclaimed happily and darted round the corner before Ward could stop him. Ward quickly followed in case the team weren't alone.

The teams' half-second happy faces changed immediately to cautious (hatred in some cases) as Ward rounded the corner, all of them ready to fight him.

"The exit's that way," Ward helpfully pointed to a corridor on their left.

"Why should we trust you?" Skye scoffed. "You set this whole thing up!"

"You think  _I_ set this up?" he said disbelievingly, about to make a comment on her naivety before deciding it probably wouldn't help things.

"Yeah, I do," she shot back icily before barely masked concern mixed with anger came into her voice. "What they hell happened to you anyway?"

"I-"

"Actually, save it, I don't care, whatever happened to you, you probably deserved it,"  _you probably faked it too, just to gain our trust again._ Skye thought angrily.

"Sir, give me your gun," Ward said, gesturing to the gun that Coulson had 'borrowed', ignoring Skye as the team began to hear far-off shouts.

"Don't do it Coulson, he'd probably love to shoot you with your own gun!" Skye exclaimed and Tip nodded.

"Skye, shut up, I am trying to buy you more time!" Ward said through gritted teeth.

"Skye has a point," Coulson interjected. "How do we know we can trust you?"

"Because-" Fitz tried to explain but Ward cut him off.

"Screw it," he told them and sprinted towards the voices.

"Run!" ordered Coulson, but Fitz stayed frozen to the spot, looking worriedly in the direction that Ward had gone, listening to the grunts of pain and yells of 'this way'.

Jemma grabbed his wrist and pulled Leo away, yanking him out of his trance and together they flew along the corridor after the others.


	2. 'Is Ward Evil?'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to all the people that left kudos and the bookmark too! :)

Jemma pulled Leo along the corridors, the others just ahead and Hydra, now only a few feet behind. Simmons careered round yet another of the corridors in the seemingly never ending complex and nearly slammed into Skye, who stood pondering the crisscrossing of intricate shiny red lasers.

"So they have rubbish security up until now, and then they go decide to get lasers?" she complained.

"The automatic slamming doors and the knockout gas didn't count?" Fitz asked frantically, whilst May calmly wove her way through the deadly lights.

"Get behind me!" Coulson ordered the team, they flattened themselves against the walls and Coulson got ready to shoot anyone who dared put a foot round the corner.

There came a low droning sound from behind them and the team (sans Coulson, who was still concentrating intently on the bend) swung round to see the lasers powering down, May having already run on to take on whatever was in the next corridor.

Following her they found a giant hanger, stuffed to bursting with new weaponry, probably due to be tested, and inept guards in the process of being knocked out by May.

"Guess that's why they needed the security," Fitz figured and Coulson took no time in selecting the most heavily armoured (and coolest looking) plane.

A bullet just missed his head and Simmons screamed; apparently Hydra had finally caught up.

"Come on!" Fitz yelled, dragging Jemma this time and diving towards the plane, ducking to avoid the rain of bullets.

Coulson threw the gun to Triplett and jumped over seats to get to the cockpit and start the engine. Trip alternated between gunning down Hydra agents and urging the team to run faster. May was last on board, having been in the process of disarming many agents, and indicated for Trip to close the ramp, racing to help Coulson take off the plane.

The plane lifted off in a whirl of engines and broke through the hanger doors, the younger agents wincing at the sound, although nothing happened.

"We're safe now, right?" Skye questioned, Fitzsimmons looked hopeful but everyone else remained impassive.

"Hopefully," Coulson replied. "This plane looks like it should withstand a small missile, however…"

"They're gonna shoot missiles at us?" Fitz exclaimed.

Suddenly there was a rush of air and everyone was jolted backwards.

"Not anymore," May clarified and Coulson started obsessively inspecting the console.

"This jet can go supersonic!?" he said in amazement and the plane zoomed towards the horizon.

 

 

 

The sunset found Fitz and Simmons sitting opposite each other in Simmons's bunk, both leaning back against the wall, a cool box with alcohol in the middle. They sat in companionable silence and stared out the window, looking down at the clouds that flowed serenely below them; Fitz took a sip from his glass and then gazed thoughtfully at Simmons.

"Do you think Ward's evil?" Fitz asked her and she frowned.

"He threw us out of a plane Fitz, after everything we've been through," she replied gently. "Yes, he helped us this afternoon, but that doesn't mean that we can trust him, he didn't just help us because he cared about us, if he cared about us he wouldn't have betrayed us for Hydra, I don't know what his motives were, but if he was trying to worm his way back into the team, it won't work, everyone hates him. Why are you going through this again, I thought you gave up your brainwashing theories when he left us at the bottom of the ocean to die?"

"That's just it," explained Fitz. "He said that it was between shooting us or putting us in a metal box where we'd be safe, do you think he meant it?"

Jemma put her glass down on the floor and reached over the box to give Fitz a hug. "No," she sighed. "He spent the better part of a year lying to us Leo, he didn't mean it, he was just manipulating you again," she removed her arms from around his neck and slumped back against the wall. "Don't worry about it, okay?"

He nodded and they went back to staring out the window. "But Jemma," he reasoned, after about a minute of silence. "The escape route he showed us  _was_  really good,"

Simmons smiled ruefully at him. "He probably just wants us alive so we can be pawns in one of his future plans,"

"Yeah," Fitz agreed reluctantly. "So how are we going to guilt trick Coulson into getting me a monkey?"

 

 

 

Fitz left Jemma's bunk an hour and a half later, his mind full of plans of what he was going to tell Coulson tomorrow. The sun had almost fully set and the sky outside was dark. May had landed the plane and had probably gone to bed, seeing as she got up most mornings at five, Trip was undoubtedly fanboying over Howling Commando gadgets with Coulson, who was most likely in his office, reorganising SHIELD and Skye had gone straight to her bunk and hadn't been seen or heard from since they had arrived back at the bus.

As he was about to open the door to his bunk he froze in thought, then weighed up his options. After having a quick debate in his head he spun around and headed down to the labs, although Simmons had a point, surely it wouldn't hurt to hack into that Hydra base. He realised he needed answers, definitive proof of whose side Ward was actually on, Jemma was right, he probably shouldn't worry about it, but he wouldn't be okay until he had answers.

Although Fitz was nowhere as good as Skye, he wasn't bad, he worked with tech after all and the DWARFs had had to have been programmed, so he may as well try. He booted up his computer and went to fetch himself some coffee, if he was going to be up a while, he was going to need it.

"Hi," Skye greeted from a darkened corner of the kitchen and Fitz couldn't help jumping and letting out a gasp of alarm. Skye raised an eyebrow. "Cookies?" she offered, holding out a plate.

Fitz took one, munching on it gratefully whilst looking for the coffee, Skye watched him curiously, whilst thinking dejectedly about what Ward would say if he caught her eating this many cookies, apparently, having a healthy diet was important for a field agent, well, screw him, she didn't care.

"What's with the coffee?" she enquired. "Surely you want to be going to sleep not keeping yourself awake with…whoa that's insane amounts of caffeine!"

"Uh, I'm working on…something," answered the scientist vaguely, reaching out for another biscuit. "Do  _you_ think Ward's evil?"

"Honestly, I dunno," Skye admitted. "When he betrayed us, I was confused and hurt, so I was angry, but now, I've had time to think it through and I'm just confused, nothing makes sense, and seeing him today, it just…uh…I tried to forget about it this afternoon through Netflix but every character reminds me of him and then beating the crap out of a punching bag, which didn't work either, the cookies are nice though,"

"I don't believe Ward set the ambush," Fitz told her thoughtfully.

"Coulson didn't either," Skye agreed.

Fitz nodded. "When he rescued me he looked like hell, you commented on it, do you think that something happened to him or that it was just a rouse to make it look like he was rescuing us and was really on our side?"

"I dunno, it kinda reminded me of when he showed up at Providence so I freaked out because he tricked me with that last time, bad memories," she shrugged.

Fitz took another cookie. "You wanna hack Hydra?"

"Yep," Skye replied, grabbing what was left of the cookies and heading down to the lab. "If it means I can finally prove to myself that all he is is a lying son of a bitch,"

 

 

 

Once Skye had grabbed her laptop, they headed down to the lab and began the hack, Fitz was grateful for the fact that Skye was with him, everything went more smoothly and about a hundred times quicker than he had anticipated with her on his side, effortlessly moving past Hydra's firewalls to locate the mainframe.

"So, what do you want to check first?" Skye enquired and Fitz thought for a moment, all he had planned was getting into Hydra's secure data, not actually what the plan was when he had achieved this.

"The CCTV footage, I want to see if he managed to get out, or if he's in some business meeting with Red Skulls replacement," Fitz decided and Skye manoeuvred her way towards the cameras. She hesitated before she entered the last few pieces of code though.

"Fitz," she said quietly. "What if we see him…and he's dead, do you really want to see that?" Leo got the feeling that the question was directed towards herself just as much as it was to him.

He nodded decisively. "Yeah, if he is, it's kind of closure right? We don't have to worry about it anymore, and it means Jemma will stop fussing all the time, so it will be good for her too,"

Skye bit her lip and hundreds of little squares of light appeared on the screen.

"Uh…" Fitz said helplessly but Skye was already at work, zooming in and eliminating anything trivial.

"Oh my god," Fitz gasped and Skye swore, wishing that she'd either found this earlier instead of moping, or had it in her to dismiss it.

Fitz was pale. "We've got to do something!"

"What do you want me to do, mind control them?" she snapped, drawing in a shaky breath and tapping a few more keys.

Fitz ran a hand through his hair and searched around the lab, his eyes flicking over every cupboard, every surface, for something that might help them. "I dunno, but we've got to stop them,"

"Come on," Skye argued, falling back into her more confident persona. "He probably knew we were going to hack the cameras, he spent time on the bus, he knows what we'd do, he's just playing us,"

"How can you say that? They're torturing him Skye!" Fitz argued frantically, frustrated at her now calm response.

She shrugged. "Apparently, SHIELD train specialists on how to deal with torture and he has a stupidly high pain tolerance because of his insane brother!"

"His what?" Fitz asked.

"Doesn't matter," she brushed his question away and continued with the hack. "But if you wanna go do something stupid, you're on your own,"

 

 

 

One and a half sickening hours later and Fitz (and Skye, although she was trying not to show it) was getting desperate.

"We've got to rescue him," Fitz decided for the 50th time and Skye looked like she wanted to agree.

"He could still be tricking us, he's been trained for this kinda thing, remember?" she argued. "Besides, the rest of the team would never agree to it,"

"Then why don't  _we_  go  _now_?" Fitz pointed out. "Look, he may be tricking us, this might all be just a ruse, but what if it's not, do you really want that on your conscience?"

"He chucked you out of…" Skye started but Fitz glared at her. She glanced at the clock, 1:30 am, and nodded hesitantly, downing the rest of the cup of coffee in one gulp.

"Suitable clothing, weapons, including ICERs, some of those odourless food thingys, water and a med kit, obviously, bullet proof jacket, uh…" she ran through the list, wondering what Ward would have told her to bring.

"We should also leave a note for Coulson, telling him where we're going, with some of the stuff we've uncovered," Fitz suggested.

"'Cause that will make him worry about us less," Skye replied sarcastically. "Meet here in fifteen minutes," she agreed and rushed off to find her stuff.

 

 

 

"We're five miles away, cut the headlights," Skye ordered, sitting shotgun in an armoured jeep, curled up with a tablet resting on her lap, giving off the air of being completely relaxed.

"And what if we go off the cliff?" Fitz demanded.

"The moon's out, we can see," Skye told him and Fitz did as she'd asked, letting Hydra know they were there would be certain suicide anyway. "Faster!" Skye urged Fitz, who was driving at about five miles an hour. He sped up a tiny bit and Skye began her hack, she was in range of the Hydra base now. "Cutting all feeds, including satellite, heat sensors and CCTV… and replacing them with feed from two hours ago," Fitz gripped the steering wheel tighter as she began her running commentary. "If it worked and Hydra hasn't sensed anything's wrong, we should be able to get in and out within two hours, so, we'd better not take longer than that. Oh and GPS linked with the blueprints of the Hydra base say stop…here,"

The car screeched to a halt and the tablet almost flew out of Skye's hands.

Once they had figured out a safe place to hide the jeep they used the Backscatter Glasses to search for the hidden entrance. After Skye had disabled all the alarms Fitz dropped down into the tunnel (which was really a secret escape route for Hydra agents) as he had all the technology and Skye followed.

"This is such a bad idea," she muttered.

 

 

 

After trekking down the never ending silver corridor they eventually came to an open air vent; if senior Hydra agents wanted to make a good emergency escape tunnel, they wanted to make sure it was accessible. Fitz looked at her questioningly so Skye flicked a few buttons on her tablet.

"You've memorised the route right?" she asked, and he nodded.

"It was so much easier than some of the tests SHIELD did to help me recover," he told her. "Stupid really, I could probably have remembered stuff like that at eight,"

"Great, because this one heads straight into the heart of the complex, so lead the way," she gestured to the vent and Fitz climbed in, Skye put the tablet into the specially designed pocket on the back of her bullet proof vest before following him.

 

 

 

"What's taking so long?" Skye hissed after they had been crawling for about twenty minutes, her neck was beginning to hurt and she was grumpy from the lack of sleep.

"Unlike you," Fitz responded quietly. "My field of expertise isn't the field, it's  _engineering,_ and my technology is telling me that we're coming up on a room of Hydra agents so shut up!"

They both lapsed into silence and they wriggled as noiselessly as possible, hopefully Hydra would put down the bit of clattering to hot water pipes.

At long last Fitz crawled over a grate and pointed downwards.

 

 

 

Ward was exhausted, after long giving up finding a comfortable position to lie in, he lay curled up against the wall in his cell, trying to ignore the pain and sleep. Sleeping may have not exactly been the most sensible of choices, but if he had any chance of withstanding his interrogators, he needed it, besides, he was a light sleeper, he'd hear the door opening.

A quiet banging-scraping sound came from above him and Ward tensed, ready to attack, whatever that was could not be good.

He listened to the scrape of a vent being lifted off and frowned in confusion, who was it, an old enemy of his, SHIELD wanting to take him away from Hydra so they could question him, their methods would probably be more gentle, but then again, he had betrayed the team, and as far as he was aware, the majority of them still hated him.

Which was why it came as a surprise when Fitz lowered himself through the entrance; landing with considerable less precision than Ward, he fell backwards onto the floor. Ward, reacting purely on instinct, jumped on top of him and almost slammed the side of his fist into Fitz's head. His eyes widened when he saw who it was.

"What the hell are you doing here," Ward demanded angrily, but looked bewildered and terrified.

"Fitz got it into his head that we had to rescue you," Skye replied casually, jumping down after Fitz, the scientist glared at her.

"You have to leave now!" he exclaimed frantically.

"Not without you, Ward," Fitz pleaded. "Come with us this time, look at what they did to you,"

Ward was suddenly aware of crippling pain, now that the rush of adrenalin had died away and Fitz had pointed out his injuries again. He swayed slightly but otherwise showed no discomfort, instead raising an eyebrow. "No," he said firmly. "You and Skye  _have_ to get out of here  _now_! I'll slow you down, the guards could be back any minute and…"

"Ward, we spent all this time figuring out a way to break you out so you're damn well coming with us!" Skye shot back angrily.

Suddenly the door flew open and Hydra guards swarmed the room.

"Why couldn't you just have listened to me?" Ward groaned as the three of them pressed against the wall with their hands behind their heads.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please leave kudos, comment etc, next chapter should be up soon!


	3. The Hydra Base

"Nice to see you here again," a tall man in a smart suit, who looked like he spent every second of his non-criminal-mastermind time working out, said to Fitz. "Still, I doubt you're here to take up our offer,"

"I thought you said that they didn't care about you Ward?" the female said casually after Fitz had refused to answer, her voice held a patronising quality, just as it had earlier, when she had been talking to Fitz.

"They're here to take me to interrogation," Ward replied calmly. "Guess they want the drug just as much as Hydra does,"

"Because they seem like such an intimidating force," she drawled sarcastically.

"Hey, we've been trained by the cavalry, just don't call her that, she doesn't like being called that, okay, but, appearances are deceptive," Skye rambled and shot back.

"Says the girl who got shot and the boy who got thrown out a plane," she smiled sweetly, but her eyes were pits of evil. "Thing is Ward, are you so sure you don't care about  _them_?" she spun around and punched Skye in the jaw. "Don't backchat," she smirked.

Ward tried to keep his cool, but his jaw tensed and his eyes flashed, meanwhile Fitz was yelling his head off and had to be restrained by a faceless Hydra guard.

"So, this is how it's going to work," the man explained. "You know about GH-325 and don't have enough personal safety concerns to tell us, so every time you refuse to answer a question from now on, we will use them to persuade you,"

Skye and Fitz's eyes widened but Ward remained stoic.

"Before we begin, can I just point out that there are other ways of doing this," the woman stated. "Fitz, you're a scientist and Skye, the drug was used on you, surely you were both curious to know information about it, got any details you'd like to share,"

"Excellent plan," the man agreed and kicked Ward in the chest, an eerie silence followed as everyone heard a resounding snap. Fitz and Skye looked horrified. "Interrogation works both ways,"

"We'll give you a time to think about it while we get the security systems back online. Make sure Coulson and the rest of his ragtag team don't interfere with our plans,"

The Hydra agents left the room and locked the door behind them.

"Oh my god Ward, are you okay?" Fitz ran over to him, Skye looked torn but went over to him too.

"It cracked cleanly, I should be fine," he answered. "What about you two?"

"Just a few bruises from the attempted rescue," Fitz told him.

"Well, my jaw kinda hurts. How are we going to escape?" Skye asked.

Ward nodded tersely. "It's bruising," he informed her. "As for escape, I really don't know. Not that I don't appreciate it, but why have you suddenly decided to trust me, I thought that you hated me? Not that I don't blame you..."

"Trust me  _Ward_ , this isn't  _trust_ ," Skye frowned. "I wanted answers, and now I'm just using you to get out of here,"

"Skye," Ward's voice had adopted a panicked edge. "I don't know how I'm going to get you out of here!"

"Good thing I do then," Fitz smirked and fiddled with one of his shirt buttons. There was a fizzing sound and the room was plunged into darkness, the door creaked slowly open. Ward and Skye gaped at him. "It's an EMP," the scientist explained. "If the specs are right it should have knocked all power out within a ten mile radius,"

"Let's hope the bus wasn't anywhere nearby then," Skye gritted her teeth worriedly.

"According to my calculations, it's unlikely they'd have got here that quick," Fitz replied, but still looked nervous and a little guilty.

"It's definitely better than the last," Ward agreed, looking slightly angry. "I just hope you haven't almost killed anyone this time."

"Ward, Garret was a psychopath, he manipulated you, he only cared about himself," Fitz exclaimed.

Ward shook his head uncertainly, almost like he was trying to convince himself as well. "That's not true," he argued. "He did care about me, he  _must_  have done. But whether he did or not doesn't change the fact that I owe him everything!"

"So what are you gonna do, sell us out to your Hydra buddies, because the door's unlocked and we kinda need to get moving before more guards arrive," Skye gestured out into the corridor.

"I'm loyal to Garrett, not Hydra. Hydra was always a means to the end for both of us,"

"So, ignoring the fact that you're still loyal to a dead psycho that ordered me shot," Ward stared coldly at her. "Let's go!"

They ran out into the corridor only to come face to face with half a dozen armed Hydra guards.

Skye kicked the first in the stomach then quickly disarmed him, swinging round and shooting the shoulder of a guard who was about to shoot Ward. He moaned in pain and she kicked him in the head, rendering him unconscious.

Meanwhile Ward was just tearing though the other four like paper; within a minute all the guards were incapacitated. Fitz cautiously peeked round the corner and Ward analysed the corridor.

"This way," he ordered and the three of them sprinted off to the left.

"Where are we going?" Fitz asked, but Ward didn't answer, instead he leapt up onto a high window sill and smashed the glass.

"Come on," he urged, offering Fitz a hand; Skye kept her gun trained on the corridor. Fitz began to scramble up the wall with Ward's help when:

"Wait!" a voice commanded from an open door to their right.

"Why?" Skye asked the Hydra agent. He seemed nervous, young too, probably new to the job Skye figured, well, too bad. "You gonna shoot us?"

"Um...yeah," It sounded more like a question than an answer.

Ward shot him with a Night-Night gun he had acquired from one of the guards while the Agent's attention was on Skye.

She looked up at him in shock. "Come on!" he urged and reached down to help her up; if Skye had had it her way she'd have climbed up herself, however, to her annoyance, she wasn't tall enough so she had to let him.

They ran quickly along the felt roof, keeping their heads ducked and hoping that no one decided to look out the window, using the drain pipe to help them climb down the low building.

It was then they encountered the problem of the electrified fence.

There were two of them, just in case by some weird stroke of luck a person managed to get over one of the ten meter high fences.

"Your EMP will have taken this out right?" Skye asked.

"Probably," Fitz explained. "However it was just a prototype and if it didn't work and one of us gets electrocuted then..." he trailed off.

Skye picked up a stick, throwing it at the fence.

Nothing happened.

Well okay, the stick bounced off the fence, which vibrated and made a clanging sound, but that was about it.

"We'd better get climbing then," Skye grimaced, and the two ran towards the fence and pulled themselves up, or tried to, it was quite difficult.

"Wait," Ward said. "I have a knife,"

"You think that's going to cut though the matal quick enough?" Fitz questioned.

"It will have to," Ward replied tersely as he began to hack through the fence.

"Come on, come on, come on," Fitz repeated nervously, bouncing on the balls of his feet and directing his fearful, darting gaze all around them and then back to the fence.

"Shut up, I'm trying to concentrate," Ward muttered, before slicing through another piece of the metal wire, and scrambling through the gap, already working on the next fence as Skye and Fitz crawled through after him, wincing as the sharp metal ends cut into them.

They could hear shouts that were getting closer, the pandemonium at the base was enough to ensure that no one had found them yet, but a Hydra agent was bound to stumble over them sooner or later.

"Done," Ward said frantically, sliding though the gap in the second fence.

Then they ran.

It was about fifty yards to the forest and they reached it as quickly as they possibly could, hoping the darkness and branches could provide them with cover. Then they scrambled through undergrowth, dodged round branched and jumped over logs, trying to put Hydra as far behind them as possible.

"Look," Fitz pointed, his voice barely a gasp; the scientist was exhausted.

"It's the car we used to get to the warehouse," Skye exclaimed happily, the team hadn't bothered to retrieve it, cars could be replaced, and it didn't hold any secrets, weapons or latest technology.

Ward opened the door on the driver's side. "Hey, no, I'm driving," Skye ordered, pushing him out the way. He looked like he was about to argue but she scowled at him. "You can sit shotgun,"

He complied uneasily, but hastily and Fitz jumped into the backseat. Skye started the engine (the car had a key code, not a key, unlike most vehicles) and they set off, almost full speed, down the dirt track, tree branches swinging into the bullet proof windows.

 


	4. Lost

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you guys for all the kudos and the bookmark too!

The car groaned and shuddered to a stop.

"What's the matter?" Ward demanded.

"We're nearly out of gas," Skye explained.

"And I think the battery died," Fitz added, the mood did not lighten, at all.

"We need to keep moving," Ward looked nervously behind him, gripping his gun tightly.

"So you want us to walk,  _in the pitch black_!" exclaimed Skye incredulously.

"It's quite easy," Ward countered. "You just need to keep moving steadily to avoid tripping, with your arms in front of your face to protect your head,"

"Well of course it's easy for you Agent I-can-navigate-a-forest-with-my-eyes-closed Ward," Fitz snapped back, then regretted it as a wave of memories swept over him.

Ward raised an eyebrow at the comment.

"Okay, say we don't die," Skye pointed out. "What if we stumble unwittingly into Hydra Agents wearing night-vision goggles? As well as broken limbs, we'd be recaptured too,"

"Point," Ward agreed. "But we can't just sit around waiting for them to find us either. It will be fine, I used to do this all the time," Ward had realised what he'd said a millisecond after he'd opened his mouth, but had decided to continue the sentence anyway, figuring that it would be more suspicious to cut off halfway through and that it should be quite easy to think up a lie. "I used to go on camping trips, and my flashlight wasn't exactly the best quality," He said before they could question him on the subject.

"I am not walking out there at this time of night," Fitz stubbornly refused.

"Then can you mend the car?" Ward asked but the scientist shook his head.

"Not when I can't see anything, does anyone have a torch?"

"No," Ward replied. "If we had one I wouldn't be suggesting walking through the forest, you guys would actually agree with the idea and we'd have been on our way already,"

"Then go on ahead, leave us," Skye said spitefully.

"I'm  _not_  leaving you two alone to face Hydra," he argued.

"Well, we can't just sit here in the dark, what if something decides to eat us, we don't know what kind of animals live in this forest," Skye reasoned. "Let's build a fire,"

"And what if the Hydra agents see it?" Ward questioned.

"What if they see us with infra-red or night vision," argued Skye.

"Ward, we're over a hundred miles away," Fitz moaned, re-joining the conversation. "I don't want to be captured, but I want to be warm and not torn apart by some wild animal."

"So how are we going to make a fire?" Skye grinned, glad that Fitz was agreeing with her and Ward rolled his eyes, these kids were still so out of their depth; although he had to admit that they'd improved since winding down windows whilst being shot at and bringing sandwiches on secret missions.

"Well, we could start by picking up some sticks," Fitz suggested and there was the sound of the door opening and scrabbling around on the floor.

 

 

 

Two hours later and Skye awoke to the sound of a crackling fire; she looked, bleary eyed, at the sight of Ward sitting on the leafy ground and feeding leaves, pinecones and sticks to the small fire that illuminated him with a slightly eerie glow, a few flints lay beside him.

She slid out of the front of the car and sauntered over.

"I made it for Fitz," Ward explained, not thinking that Skye would take him seriously if he said that it was for her too. "It was true that it could keep us warm and keep the animals away,"

Skye and Fitz had long since given up, and curled up, exhausted, in the car, Skye in the passenger seat and Fitz sprawled out in the back, both too tired to question whether being asleep whilst Ward was awake was a good idea or not.

It seemed that Ward had built the fire close, in order to keep them slightly warm, but not so close as to be a danger if anything set on fire, or if petrol was leaking from the car.

"So, yet another thing you're good at, making a fire in the dark," Skye commented, sitting down next to him and sounding a bit more like she used to, before the incident.

Ward looked uncomfortable, but shrugged. "Basic survival skills," he explained. "All recruits at the academy can do it,"

"So," Skye began, now was as good a time as any, and it might have been the only time she would have a chance to question him on her own. "Why did you choose to follow Garret? I still don't believe and am never going to believe what Fitz said by the way, his theories are built on a ridiculous dream, false hope," she made a noise of disapproval. "I'm a realist, and I know nothing you ever do will ever erase the horrific crimes that you've committed."

Ward seemed to deflate at this point but did nothing except to answer the question in the same way he did every time he was asked.

"I owe him everything,"

Skye rolled her eyes. "Right, sure you do," she said sarcastically. "He became your SO after you'd left the Academy right? He chose you didn't he, why?"

Ward looked uncomfortable. "I don't know," he answered truthfully, because it was the truth, he didn't know why John Garret had chosen to save him when no one else would, it wasn't as if he was worth anything anyway.

"You know, I'm not sensing that's the whole truth or even the truth," Skye observed. "I think he chose you because you were  _weak_ ," she stared deep into his eyes, trying to gauge some answer from him; unsurprisingly, he stared at her uncomfortably.

"I'm not weak, definitely not since he trained me, I don't blame other people for my failures, I learn from them, I'm strong, I don't give up…or at least I wasn't weak," he admitted. "Not before the team, I'd made sure I'd eradicated all weaknesses in my life,"

"Like you tried to eradicate Fitzsimmons?" Skye demanded angrily.

"I tried to cross them off, but I failed. I'm not going to lie to you Skye, because you don't deserve that, but there's a big part of me that regrets not killing them. But-" he continued before she could interrupt him. "But I couldn't let them die, and letting them die now would feel like murder, how normal people feel about murder anyway," he clarified.

She nodded, but eyed him warily, he was dangerous and unpredictable like an unexploded bomb, the kind of person that if you trusted not to hurt you, you'd die, what he'd just confessed could not be forgotten easily.

"So did  _you_ decide to kill them while you were on the plane, or did Garret order you to take them out, or did you both mutually agree that they should no longer live?"

"Ordered." he stared down at the dusty floor, refusing to meet her gaze.

"Why?" her voice was harsh, sharp and unforgiving.

"Fitz used an EMP, causing the system that was keeping Garret alive to fail,"  _and because he knew they were a weakness,_ he left unspoken.

"So that's why you were so angry at Fitz's EMP button…" she would have mentioned to anyone else how incredibly proud Fitz was at his invention, stating how useful they were, and that he was going to make one for everyone on the team. However she had a feeling that it wouldn't be a good idea to tell this to Ward, who clearly held resentment to Fitz for nearly killing his good-for-nothing SO.

"But that still doesn't explain why you still believe that you owe him everything!"

"He saved me," Ward replied cryptically.

"From what?"

"Hell,"

There was an impossibly long pause. "Your family?" Skye asked quietly.

Ward's eyes widened slightly but he kept his cool. "No, how could he have done?" he argued logically. "Garrett became my SO  _after_ I'd left the Academy."

"I bet he met you before the Academy, didn't he?" Skye pressed, going on a whim. "I tried to get back the information about you that I'd destroyed, Ward, there was a gap of about five years,"

"Guess you're just that good at permanently deleting stuff," Ward shrugged.

"Oh yeah, what were you doing then then?" she smiled sweetly, watching him intently and Ward froze, damn it, did Skye  _know_ , how could she possibly know though, what was his cover story for that again, what was it about Skye's eyes, god that girl still intrigued him, now what was he supposed to be thinking of? Cover story, right, got it.

"Military Academy,"

Skye gave a derisive laugh. She knew he was lying,  _damn it,_ why did he have to get so distracted, wasn't he not meant to panic, ever; what was wrong with him? She squinted at him, like a hunter, moving in on the kill.

"I think Garret was brainwashing you  _then,_ "

Ward raised an eyebrow. "I thought you said Fitz's theories were stupid, and that's ridiculous, Garrett would never have done that to me, he helped me for god's sake Skye!"

"So you did know him before, interesting," she commented.

"I didn't say that, I  _never_  said that!" Ward said frustratedly, god, his lies were slipping away, being torn apart by the hacker, hacking into his emotions, his secrets, but no, no one must ever find out about living in the woods, Garret would kill him.  _ **Would have**_ _killed me_ , he reminded himself sadly,  _but Garrett's the one that is dead now_.

"You were avoiding the question, but I inferred it from your answer," Skye replied coolly, wondering if she was correct, all it really was, was guesswork, and she hadn't been able to tell that Ward was lying when he was part of their team…

"Garrett didn't brainwash me, I'm not  _weak_  like that, I was _always_  in control!"

Skye shook her head, smiling sadly. "Ward, trusting him was your downfall, not trusting in us,"

Then she walked back to the car and climbed inside, resisting the urge to pull him into a hug and comfort him, he reminded her of a lost kid, not sure of which way to turn, trying to make sense of everything, but failing miserably and making the wrong choices, like getting into someone's car if they offered him sweets. However, he was a Hydra agent who had betrayed her team, betrayed her, all for some narcissistic bastard, she mustn't lose sight of what she believed in, Grant Ward was evil,  _right?_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would like to point out that in no way shape or form do I think brainwashing/manipulation victims are weak, that was just what I believe Ward's point of view would be and does not represent the truth, I believe it can happen to anyone, even the people with the strongest will-power.
> 
> Also, please comment (I'd like to know what you guys think) as well as leaving kudos etc.


	5. That's not a weakness, is it?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, sorry I am so late with an update again, I had writers block and couldn't figure out how to connect the first bit of the chapter to the last (thanks to my real life best-friend, the fanfiction.net user NightStarlightWolf for helping me get from a to b)and I was also extremely busy, real life’s annoying.

 “Is he going to wake up anytime soon?” Ward whispered loudly to Skye. They were standing outside the car, peering in through the windows at Fitz, who still appeared to be sleeping. Skye had convinced Ward that the sun was barely up so they had loads of time to get moving and that Fitz deserved a couple more minutes. Ward was currently hoping to ‘accidentally’ wake Fitz up as he was doing his best to get along with Skye and Fitz, it could only work in their favour if Hydra recaptured them and they didn’t completely hate each other.

“I’ve been awake for the last few minutes, it was just hilarious listening to you two bickering,” Fitz grinned at Skye and opened his eyes. Skye raised her eyebrows but Ward sighed.

“Fitz we really need to get moving,”

“I don’t know if that’s the safest idea,” Fitz countered. “I’ve heard all the stories where people get lost in forests and end up waking in circles because all the trees look the same, what if we ended up walking back to the Hydra base?”

“I can navigate a forest fine,” Ward gritted his teeth. “Look, there’s the sun, it’s approximately seven am and that way’s north,”

“Good,” Fitz agreed, opening the door and getting out of the car. “But do you know which state we’re in?”

“That’s not relevant,” Ward argued. “Our first priority should be getting as far away from Hydra as possible, when we find a town we can worry about where we are,”

“We’re in Wyoming,” Skye informed them both, then grabbed Fitz and hauled him towards the trees, not noticing how Ward paled at her statement. “Just wanna discuss with Fitz whether he can get the car’s Satnav system to work as a mobile unit, it’ll be easier to find a town if we know exactly where we are,”

“Do you trust him,” Skye asked, looking at him with concern when they were far enough away. “Because you don’t seem to be as worried as you should that we have a Nazi with us,”

“I’m not worried, I honestly don’t think he’s evil Skye,” Fitz explained. “I mean, I only trust him about 26% at the moment, but he won’t kill us Skye; besides, you’re the one who’s been acting like you trust him, five minutes ago, you were fighting like you were still on the bus and trying to convince him that it was early and lie-ins were way better that training,”

“I was not,” Skye shot back. “He might be _temporarily_ helping us now, but he still threatened to rape me or something back at Cybertech,”

“That’s ridiculous,”

“Well it sounded like it!”

Suddenly there came a yell of surprise and they ran back to the clearing to see Ward backing away from a medium size dog with half an ear missing.

Skye smirked. _Ward, the T-9000, scared of dogs, since when?_ “Ward, it’s not gonna hurt you,” she grinned. “It’s wagging its tail, see…” the dog turned around and let off a warning growl to Skye and Fitz. “But it doesn’t like me for some reason, seriously, it likes you, _the robot_ , when there are people like me and Fitz around,”

Ward looked a cross between, petrified, confused, upset and resigned. “Go to Skye and Leo,” Ward told the dog. “Go on,”

The dog put its paw on Ward’s knee and whined. Skye, having temporarily forgotten that Ward was a Hydra agent, was cursing herself for not having a phone on her, this was such a great moment and she was quite upset that she couldn’t share it with the rest of the team. Well, it would have been an adorable moment, if Ward hadn’t looked like he was in hell.

“We should probably take it with us,” Fitz pointed out. “It would be cruel to leave the poor thing all on its…his own out here,”

“What about his owners?” Skye asked.

“Have you seen his ear,” Fitz said disdainfully. “They probably shot the dog or something,”

Ward, who had almost resigned himself to the fact that he was going to have to stroke the canine, froze.

“Ward, what’s wrong?” Skye questioned.

He shook his head. “Nothing,” he lied.

“Well come on then,” Skye said impatiently. “Like you said, we have to keep moving before Hydra gets here and seeing as he’s got such a close attachment to you, you get dog-sitting duty,”

Ward nodded and stood up, the dog pattered along close beside him and Skye had to admit that it was a nice scene.

“Oh Buddy you have fleas,” Ward moaned suddenly after about two minutes of walking and then looked nervous as if it were something he shouldn’t have said, Buddy perked up though, glad to hear his name finally spoken aloud.

“Well, first stop’s the vets then,” Fitz shrugged. “Hey, Buddy’s a good name, we should call him Buddy,”

“I didn’t mean it like that…” Ward started to mumble whilst Skye exclaimed.

“Wait no, we shouldn’t name him, we should wait for the new owners to do that!”

“Why couldn’t we keep him on the bus?” Fitz grinned. “Coulson might say no to a monkey, but he can’t say no to a dog can he?”

Ward looked hopeful but said nothing, the bus might be a dangerous place, but he knew that Buddy would be taken care of well there, like such a loyal dog deserved.

“Come here, Buddy, come here,” Fitz said, whistling. Buddy picked up his ears and bounded over, licking Fitz’s face. “That’s definitely going to be his name,” Fitz laughed.

“Yeah, it should be,” Grant put forward.

They continued on their journey, Buddy having gone back to bounding alongside Ward, looked incredibly happy and kept sending adoring glances up at his former owner. Ward, who had managed to convince himself that Buddy was lost and confused and that he owed it to the poor dog to comfort him, was attempting to play fetch as they walked, aided by Fitz, however the dog wouldn’t leave Ward’s side, except to lick Fitz from time to time (the scientist was now hoping that Jemma would let the dog help them in the labs).

“Okay, that it is,” Skye exploded at Ward. “What the hell is going on here? ‘Buddy’ loves you and will barely leave your side, he responded to the name you ‘accidentally’ gave him and when you saw him, you looked like you’d seen a ghost, so either you know the dog, or you remind him of the awful owner that shot him and the dog has some kind of messed up loyalty!”

“Just shut up!” Ward yelled at Skye, the rage of the Berserker Staff gnawing away at the back of his mind, he was breathing heavily, trying to get his emotions back under control. “I have never, ever, hurt Buddy!”

Skye and Fitz looked questioningly at Ward, who was now in much better control of what came out of his mouth, and regretted his choice of words.

“Lack of sleep, sometimes I get confused with my tenses when I’m tired – sorry,” he amended.

“So, you did know him?” Fitz asked.

“No, Ward’s not _kind_ enough to keep a pet,” Skye accused, trying to goad Ward into giving her a reaction, seeing as apparently he wasn’t as careful with what he said when he was angry, and apparently, the super-spy was kind to dogs. “You know, I bet _you_ shot him, I bet that was what you and your Hydra buddies did for a laugh-“

“I didn’t. I didn’t _want_ to shoot him!” Ward protested venomously, the comment clearly striking a nerve, whist looking like he was trying not to have a mental breakdown.

“You, shot, the dog?” Fitz breathed, staring at Ward in confusion and horror.

“You _psycho_!” Skye screamed at him and Buddy growled at her, coming to stand in front of Ward protectively.

“Hey Buddy, don’t worry, it’s okay,” the specialist said soothingly, patting the dog’s head. “Garrett told me to,” Ward explained. “But,” he paused and ran a hand through his hair. “I didn’t, _I couldn’t_ ,” he told them, both relief and self-loathing in his words.

“Why?” Skye whispered.

“Because, he was my only friend, you can rely on dogs, they won’t let you down,” Skye nearly commented on the irony of that statement, about him betraying them. “Garrett said…that he was a weakness…I couldn’t have any weaknesses in my life as a specialist…that  once I’d gotten rid of him we could leave…he said, ‘that’s not a weakness, is it?’” Ward’s voice was barely a whisper now. “But I couldn’t do it, I just couldn’t, I tried, but he was _Buddy,_ ”

“So how come he doesn’t have his right ear?” Fitz sounded distraught.

“Garrett killed him, to punish me for not doing it myself, or at least that’s what he said anyway, I guess he shot him in the ear to make sure he bled out slowly, or maybe he just missed and…”

“Ward, he wanted Buddy to have a painful death,” Skye interjected, not seeing the point of doctoring the truth where Garret was involved.

“Well, I guess, that would be just like him, I think he said something along those lines, it got a little hazy after that,” Ward sighed. “Buddy didn’t deserve that; it was my fault, not his, I could see his point, but…”

“Ward, what is it with your crazy messed up father-son relationship with Garrett anyway?” Skye demanded. “Why didn’t you just refuse to shoot Buddy?”

“Because Garrett cared about me, he was the only one to ever believe in me,”

“Garret _didn’t_ care about you Ward,” Skye sounded frustrated. “If he had cared, he wouldn’t have made you do that. _We_ cared about you,”

“Yes he did, but I know that you all did now,” Ward agreed. “I just convinced myself that that wasn’t the real me and you wouldn’t like the real me – which you don’t – so there was no point trying, Garrett was the only one who knows who I truly am,”

“Buddy does,” Fitz protested. “And so do we, that version Garrett knew, that wasn’t the real you, it was one that he had created, the one that we were getting to know on the bus, I think that one was closer to who you really are,”

“And Ward,” Skye added. “You couldn’t kill Buddy, I guess in some ways that means that you can be a good person, Buddy trusts you, you should trust yourself with him. When we get back to SHIELD, I’ll make sure that no one ever tries to take him away from you again,”

Suddenly Buddy started growling and let off a few warning barks.

“Shh,” Ward told him and pulled out his gun.

“What is it?” Skye asked, already knowing the answer.

“Hydra,” Ward replied grimly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed, and please comment, no matter what they say, they make my day (except if they are outright hate) I am going to try to write a new chapter Thursday or Friday as I have an inset and a half-day so I hope I’m gonna have time, the more reviews I get though, the quicker I’ll update!


	6. Questions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry, I completely forgot to post this on AO3! But you can expect updates every day/every other day from now on though :)

"You are surrounded," a voice shouted through the trees. "Put your weapons on the ground and your hands behind your heads or we shoot,"

Buddy started growling, but Ward put a hand on the dog's head to calm him and pushed Buddy gently behind him, so in effect the three were forming some kind of protective triangle around the dog.

"We won't be very useful to you if you kill us," Fitz reasoned, squinting into the forest and trying to figure out where the disembodied voice had come from and where the Hydra agents that had supposedly surrounded them were.

"They're not set to kill, they're set to stun," the voice replied. "However it leaves you in a lot of pain for a few weeks and can result in hallucinations and severe fever, you will still be captured and interrogated, whether suffering the effects or not. You should cooperate, I worked for Hydra in the division of modern torture methods for a while, and it seems to me that it's human nature to avoid unnecessary pain,"

None of them moved, figuring that if they were going to be tortured anyway, starting early wouldn't make much of a difference.

"If we hit the dog it will die, this stuff's lethal to animals,"

Ward practically threw his gun to the ground. He knew that they might hurt or kill Buddy even if he did comply, they had probably already seen how much he cared about Buddy earlier and could have figured that it would be a brilliant way to torture him; however the odds were more in Buddy's favour if he did what Hydra told him to. Skye and Fitz took a few seconds to decide before following suit.

"Good, now you're all going to…" the voice cut off as the sound of gunfire rent the air. It lasted a second before all was deathly quiet again.

That is until Simmons came running through the trees.

"Fitz," she exclaimed, embracing the scientist. "I was so worried about you, don't you dare do that again. Luckily your infrared targeting system worked, you didn't have to be worried about the calibration. Although I think it could do with a few tweaks, the ICER bullets hit all of them so…" she continued with her technobabble while Coulson and May strode into the clearing.

May silently handcuffed Ward, giving him a warning look, she began to lead him back to the bus when she realised that the dog was following her.

"What do I do with the dog?" she demanded, shooting an exasperated look to Coulson.

"It stays with Ward," Fitz interrupted Coulson who had been about to speak.

"Fitz, he's a prisoner, he can't keep a dog," Coulson reasoned calmly.

"Yes he can," Skye protested. "He's surprisingly well behaved, providing you don't try to threaten Ward. So yeah, May if you're thinking of violently interrogating him, it's not on,"

"Skye, Ward can't be trusted, and frankly, given what you two did last night, I'm surprised both of you aren't dead,"

"Go to Fitz," Ward told Buddy after assessing the situation. Buddy looked at Ward with a sad expression.

"Come on Buddy, I'll take care of you," Fitz told the dog, who padded over to the scientist. "Ward will get Buddy back though, right?" Fitz asked, turning his attention away from the canine and back to the Director.

"We'll discuss that on the plane," Coulson ordered. "But right now we've got to get moving before these guys wake up,"

They walked back to the plane in silence, broken only by Fitzsimmons's infrequent comments about upgrades for the infrared targeters.

"Skye, my office, Fitz, I'll talk to you later but right now I need you to work on rebuilding the DWARFs, May, take Ward to the interrogation room, Buddy can go with him as there isn't really anyone capable of looking after him at the…no Fitz, Buddy is not allowed into the labs," he touched his ear and spoke into his com. "Trip start the plane,"

May dragged Ward to the interrogation room, an icy expression on her face, and shoved him inside, letting Buddy walk past her, before closing the door with a little more force than necessary and locking it.

Ward slumped down on the floor and let Buddy rest his head on his lap, and put his arms round the dog. "You'll be okay Buddy," he told the dog quietly.

 

 

 

"Skye, did you have any idea of what you were doing?" Coulson demanded.

"I was following my instincts," she shot back. "I thought that's why I was on the team?"

"If you wanted to try something like that you could have at least told one of us, we were worried sick, we had absolutely no idea of what had happened to you two,"

"We left a note," Skye shrugged.

"This is a note?" Coulson demanded rhetorically.

She shrugged.

"What's the deal with Ward anyway," he questioned. "He escaped, I thought he'd voluntarily gone back to Hydra,"

Skye shook her head. "Even if he did, he obviously wasn't welcome, they were violently grilling him on GH-325," she bit her lip. "And AC, I think Fitz's theories might have some truth in them,"

"What changed your mind," Coulson said, after the initial anger at the betrayal he was doing his best to keep an open mind, seeing as he was the Director of SHIELD now. He still didn't like the specialist though.

"Well, he's completely set on the idea that he owes Garrett everything, Garrett apparently saved him from hell, which may or may not have been his family, he feels like Garrett's the only one that truly understands him and oh yeah, that dog; it's Ward's, Garrett made Ward shoot it, Ward actually  _wanted to_  but loved the dog so he couldn't, so Garrett shot the dog in a way that was meant to make it die slowly and painfully as a consequence, I mean, who follows a guy like that without some seriously good reasons?"

Coulson frowned. "I'd like to ask Ward a few questions, to see if I can get to the bottom of those reasons,"

 

 

 

The door to the interrogation room swung open and Coulson strode inside.

"Sit," he gestured to the seat across the table, Ward complied and Coulson slid into the seat opposite.

"I asked you once, who are you without him?" Coulson began. "You've had some time to think about it, what's your answer?"

Ward pondered for a moment. "I don't know who I am," he replied truthfully. "But I know who I don't want to be, I don't want to be someone who follows orders without question, I know it was never my job to have one, but, I'd like a choice, in whether I have to do something or not, and I don't want to be someone who orders people to hurt others when the same objective could be achieved without that,"

"Skye told me about Buddy,"

"Then you'll know that John asked me to kill him, I want, want _ed_ , to be like him, but that, I'm not sure that I think that was right,"

Coulson nodded.

"Buddy's a nice dog you've got there, and he's clearly important to you, would you like to tell me where you got him?" he asked politely.

Ward hesitated, unsure of what he could say, if he said the wrong thing Coulson could know everything, but if he lied, and his lies didn't add up…well, in undercover work it was always best to stay as close to the truth as possible. "Garret gave him to me," he answered after a pause.

"Why?"

"I have no idea,"

"When?"

"When he became my SO," Ward said calmly.

"You're lying," Coulson inferred. "You would never have had the time or place to secretly keep a pet,"

"Which is why he told me to kill him," he replied, which was partly the truth, why he had had a dog would have also raised some unanswerable questions too.

Coulson shook his head. "You two share a strong bond, even after all this time. Somewhere in your missing five years he gave you a dog and you developed that bond. How was he training you at that time, I know for a fact that Garrett was spending a lot of time on missions with me, when did he have the time to secretly look after a kid?"

"You tell me," Ward shrugged. "And before you start to question me on what I know about Hydra too, I was a sleeper agent, I was told practically nothing, the majority of training came from SHIELD, even though they are really just both sides of the same coin,"

"Okay then, what do you think of this team?" Coulson enquired.

"I-" Grant started to reply, but was cut off by the door opening.

"Sorry Sir," Simmons apologised. "However we were listening in on the conversation and I'm afraid that Ward cannot have had that dog for more than five years. According to scans on Buddy's vitals he's roughly halfway through his adult life,"

Coulson frowned, this would disprove all of his and Skye's theories, but surely there could be no other alternative. "Are you sure?"

"I'm sure," Ward interjected, he wanted to stick with the story of getting Buddy roughly ten years ago. "Yes I was surprised at first that he's still alive, but he  _is_  my dog and he is definitely over five years old, your scans must be incorrect,"

"They can't be, though if I could just take a bit of blood, analyse it, and see if the cells…"

" _No,_ you are  _not_ going to experiment on him," Ward yelled angrily. "Sorry," he apologised, calmer now. "But you are not touching him, experimenting on him, dissecting him or whatever else you want to do,"

Simmons glared at him. "I just want blood for now, it is rather fascinating don't you think?"

"Ward, there are two explanations," Coulson hypothesised. "One, your dog is incredibly lucky, something I find hard to believe given the state he's in and the amount of time that he must have spent alone in that forest; or two he's not an ordinary dog,"

" _Or_  we could just count our blessings and leave Buddy alone,"

"But Ward, think of all the sci…"

"No, he doesn't need to be treated any worse than he already has been,"

"Ward," Simmons argued. "He's remarkably well behaved given the amount of time he's spent alone, there's something not right about…"

"Here's a theory," Skye stepped through the threshold. "What if Buddy's Asgardian?"

"What?" Ward asked after an extremely long period of silence.

"Well, it would make sense," Skye pointed out. "Asgardians must want their dogs to live for a long time, I'm not saying he's completely alien, he might just be a descendant or something, but, he's definitely lived for at least sixteen years, yet is still bouncing around like a two year old, he probably has an enhanced immune system, and he behaves incredibly well for a dog that's been on its own for that long,"

"He heals quickly," Ward added, comprehension dawning on his face. "But can people please give up the idea that I met John and he gave me Buddy before the Academy because that did not happen, I was at military school,"

"Ward, it fits the facts," Triplett added and Ward groaned internally, was everyone going to make a visit to his cell now?

"Trip, go, I need to talk to you later, Simmons, you do not have permission to take Buddy's blood, however I would like you and Skye to research dogs with out of the ordinary life spans, I want as much information as possible, the more it ties in with this other realm theory, the better,"

"You're not going to take Buddy's blood sir?" Ward asked in confusion after the other three had left.

"No, not without your consent," Coulson told him. "If you agree to it, only then will I allow Simmons to do any cellular research,"

Ward nodded but wasn't convinced, not that he let Coulson see that, instead he chose to adopt a neutral expression, looking completely at ease.

"So, what do you think of the team?" Coulson repeated.

"I like all of you," Ward said slowly. "I'm pretty sure none of you return that gesture after what I've done, but I do have a great respect for your team,"

"What do you think about helping us take down Hydra?" Coulson asked; Ward remained expressionless and silent. "There will of course be measures put in place to guarantee everyone's safety, you will sleep here and if you even think about betraying us and I will put a bullet through your head, it's not an ideal situation, but then again none of this is, we can't really be picky about our allies,"

"Okay," Ward decided. "If you really mean that,"

"I have hunches about people," Coulson replied, smiling sadly. "They usually turn out to be correct, Skye proved to be an asset after all. Plus I think this team is the best thing that has ever happened to you, except for apparently John Garrett, and I think you'd be a fool to throw that away, you're right, they don't like you, and quite frankly I don't like you, but I think it's the best option you've got. And Ward, I welcome people who question my orders, this team does it all the time; SHIELD isn't the same anymore, people serve under me because they want to, not because they have to or think they have to, if there's anything you're not comfortable with, tell me," and with that Coulson made his exit.

"Thank you sir," Ward said as Coulson closed the door behind him.

Coulson smiled as he locked the door and went to find the rest of his team.

After a few minutes, Ward slid off the chair and resumed sitting on the floor with Buddy, hoping, but not believing, that Coulson actually meant what he'd said.


	7. Some Answers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, sorry, I had an insane amount of homework and then had to go away at the weekend which I really wasn’t expecting :(
> 
> Oh my god, I can’t wait to watch the next season, not many hours left now!
> 
> Also, the receptionist is an OC, if there are any characters in the Marvel universe called Wires I don’t know about them, I was just staring at my keyboard box trying to think of a name so I made it up.
> 
> Also, I do talk about hell in this chapter, I’m not making any connotations to religion, but he thinks he’s dead, so where’s the logical place to be if he wakes up? I hope I haven’t offended anyone.

"Hey AC, can I talk to you for a moment?" Skye asked as Coulson walked past after his meeting with Triplett. The team's new specialist hadn't been able to shed much light on the Ward situation, although Coulson knew more about the missions Garret carried out that were probably related to Hydra. Some things Garrett had asked Triplett to do were against his moral code and Garrett's favourite reply had been 'Ward would've done it', which worried the Howling Commando's grandson a bit.

"Yeah sure," he replied.

"Well, I wasn't helping Simmons like I was meant to, but I was searching around on the internet and dug up some records that someone in SHIELD tried to dispose of a while ago  _and_  guess who John Garret broke out of juvie sixteen years ago?"

"Ward." Coulson replied gravely.

"Dead on, Grant Ward, born January 7th 1983, arrested for burning down his parent's house with his older brother still inside, blah blah, did you know he did that?" she asked curiously, flicking absentmindedly down through the file.

"Yeah, SHIELD did, it was there when I read his file, it said that he'd spent five years in military school though, after the judge cleared him of all charges,"

"You really think he spent all that time at a military school?" Skye questioned incredulously.

"Not a chance," Coulson replied. "I think this is the evidence we needed to prove our theories though, Ward must have developed that bond with Buddy during that time, and he couldn't have been doing that at military school, so, what was Garrett doing with the two of them at the time?...Skye, I need you to dig up as much as possible on John Garret, aliases, plane tickets,credit card bills, what he bought from the store, I want to know  _everything_ ,"

She nodded. "Trust me, I want to get to the bottom of this just as must as you do, I want to find out what that bastard did to Ward, I'll get back to you as soon as I can,"

 

 

 

"Hi," Triplett began, strolling into Ward's new room. Ward jumped, and blinked rapidly, like he had been asleep, which, Trip guessed,he probably had,no one on the bus slept regular hours and it was likely his sleep pattern had got messed up during his time in captivity with Hydra. Ward pushed himself away from Buddy, who he had been snuggling against, his shirt crumpling slightly as he stood up, revealing part of an injury to his shoulder.

"Hey are you okay?" Triplett asked. "I could get a med kit if you want,"

"Why?" Ward asked, confused.

"For your shoulder," Trip pointed out, as if it should be obvious.

"This," he shrugged. "This is nothing, I can barely even notice the pain,"

"Okay," he stated. "It's fine to pretend on missions, when tending to injuries isn't as important as the lives of others, but that cut is deep and barely healed, it looks infected too,"

"I'm not pretending," Ward disagreed. "I can deal with way more than this,"

"Oh yeah, what is something more than this?"

Ward, fed up with what he assumed was Triplett's fake concern, lifted up his t-shirt. "Bigger than this," he clarified.

"What the hell did Hydra do to you," he exclaimed in horror. "How are you even walking?"

"What?"

"I'm getting the med-pack no arguments," Trip told him, opening the door again.

"Uh, Simmons hates me," Ward pointed out. "She won't help me, not after what I did,"

"I have medical expertise too, you know," he told him. "And you're wrong about Simmons, I think she would help you,"

 

 

 

"So, what counts as 'way more than this," Triplett asked conversationally, whilst placing gauze over a cut on Ward's back.

"Mission injuries," Ward shrugged, 'and my family' remained unspoken. "We do have a dangerous line of work you know, and I can do this myself, Buddy stop licking me, that won't help,"

"You always do stuff like this by yourself?"

"Yeah," Ward replied. "Unless it's anything life threatening, then, don't worry, I will go to the hospital, Simmons was the only one who ever helped me,"

"Not even Garrett?" Trip said in bewilderment.

"Did he ever help you?" Ward pointed out.

"Well no, but I figured you guys were closer,"

Ward shook his head. "Getting injured was my fault, so I fixed it, like I said to Skye, I don't concern other people with my failures,"

"What?" Trip exclaimed and Ward grimaced internally, sometimes he forgot what was socially acceptable and what wasn't.

Just then Skye burst into the room, marched across to Ward and waved a tablet in his face. "What did Garrett do to you in the woods?" she practically yelled.

"What?" Ward's face paled.

"Plane tickets, petrol bills, all place you in the vicinity of the area of woods we found Buddy in earlier," she explained

"Has it ever occurred to you that there could just have been a Hydra base in that vicinity?"

"Were you in a Hydra base in those woods?" When Ward didn't answer she elaborated. "He bought a dog from Greg's pet shop five days before he broke you out of prison when you were fifteen, took you somewhere, then turned up back at SHIELD the next day, claiming that he just needed a bit of a holiday,"

"I was at military school," Ward said, although the lie seemed futile now.

"Did that military school happen to include training at the Hydra base, did he drop you off and hand you over to them, did the people who were torturing you train you once? You  _were_  brainwashed weren't you," she finished quietly.

"I didn't even  _know_  about Hydra when I was fifteen!"

"Then what happened Ward?" Skye pleaded. "John's dead, why can't you tell me?"

"We know most of the truth anyway," Trip reasoned. "Why can't you just explain everything, if we knew the truth, it would be so much better for everyone,"

"He abandoned me in the woods for five years," Ward said quickly, his hands clutching Buddy's fur tightly.

"What, completely on your own?"

"Except for Buddy," Skye put in.

"Well, he visited me occasionally," Ward said, as if that made it alright.

"Skye I need to tall to you outside," Triplett said.

"Yeah," Skye agreed, looking a little dazed.

When they had left Ward slumped back against the wall and put his head in his hands. Dead people's wishes were meant to be respected weren't they? He had said exactly what Garrett had made very clear he never wanted anyone finding out about, he was a horrible person, he knew that much, after betraying his father figure so completely, what good person could ever do that? He owed it to Garrett to be loyal to him after all he had done for him, why couldn't he do something so simple, why did he let himself listen to the team, to care about them, to fool himself into believing that they cared about  _him_? Buddy nuzzled his head against Ward's palm and licked it soothingly. "What have I done Buddy?" he asked, his voice breaking.

 

 

 

They walked halfway through the lounge area and then Trip turned to Skye with a serious expression.

"Well I can certainly see why he was loyal to Garrett if he was the only one that Ward spoke to apart from Buddy for five years,"

"He's probably got some form of Stockholm Syndrome," he agreed, both of them wishing that they had realised this sooner.

"How could he have survived on his own for that long though," Skye mused, thinking she unfortunately already knew the answer.

"He probably had to kill animals," Trip said logically.

"Which explains why he's desensitised to killing people" she added.

"I told you he was brainwashed," Fitz said happily, walking quickly across the room to join the other two, Simmons hot on his heels. "We were listening in on your conversation," he explained. "We basically have the feed up all the time in the lab,"

"It still doesn't mean we should trust him," Jemma interjected. "For all we know that could have been some cleverly crafted lie, he's done it before after all,"

"I don't think he's lying," Fitz argued and Skye nodded.

"He could have killed you, but he didn't," Skye said quietly.

"So you're finally on my side then?" Fitz questioned.

"I guess," she smiled. "I wasn't trying to look for the cause before, I was just mad at him, and I regret that now,"

"You should be mad at him," May said emotionlessly, making her way down from Coulson's office and towards the cockpit. "You're being too hopeful, he's not redeemable, he'll betray you all again,"

"You three go talk to Coulson," Fitz offered, ignoring May. "I'll go see if Ward's okay, he looked awful through the security cameras, "

Triplett and Skye nodded but Simmons protested. "What if he attacks you?"

"Then I'll shoot him with my ICER," Fitz lied, walking towards the cell, he didn't have an ICER and as far as he was aware, didn't need one where Ward was concerned.

Fitz unlocked the door and pushed it open. "Are you alright?" he inquired, sitting down next to Ward slowly. "I was watching when you told Skye and Triplett about the woods and you didn't look too good afterwards." Ward gave no reply so Fitz continued. "The others are in a meeting with Coulson now by the way,"

He was still met with silence.

"Ward, please speak to me," Fitz begged. "Look, I'm sorry me and Simmons watched your conversation, but we wanted to know what actually happened, not the abridged version with important details cut out!"

"I'm not going to talk to you Fitz," Ward spoke quietly.

"Well, tough, because you're going to have to," Fitz smiled confidently. "Why?"

Ward sighed but explained anyway. "I completely failed Garrett, that was a thing that I was never meant to tell anyone, ever. What if I open my mouth and say something stupid again, I am meant to follow his orders, especially now he's dead, you're meant to respect the wishes of the dead Fitz!"

"No, you're not," Fitz said firmly. "Because dead people aren't alive and you are, it's your job to live  _your_  life how you want it to be, and you especially shouldn't be lamenting on the fact that you aren't doing everything he told you to, he was a bad person Ward, he left you alone in that forest, remember? Besides, you followed all your orders to the best of your ability, right?"

"No, I didn't," Ward moaned. "I could have been so much better, I could have been someone that he was actually proud of. And he didn't leave me alone in the woods, I was with Buddy and I could have left any time I wanted to,"

"So, why did you stay then, Ward!" Fitz exclaimed, looking at the man like he was crazy.

"To prove that I wasn't weak, to prove that I could take care of myself, I don't blame others for my problems Fitz. He helped me, he  _saved_  me, why can't you see that!"

"You blamed the team for making you weak," he pointed out.

"No," Ward corrected. "I blame myself for letting you guys make me weak, which you're still doing by the way, do you mind leaving?"

"Everything's weakness with you isn't it," Fitz ignored what Ward had just said. "Is that what he said when he told you to kill us, asked if we were a weakness?"

Ward looked in confusion at the scientist, who, it seemed, was remarkably perceptive, and nodded slowly.

Fitz rolled his eyes and groaned. "Someday you'll see who he truly was," he stated and stood back up. "Ward, you must be hungry, what do you and Buddy say to a prosciutto and buffalo mozzarella sandwich with a hint of homemade pesto aioli,"

"Okay," Ward agreed, smiling. "As long as you don't put any truth serum in it,"

"I thought you said that didn't exist?" Fitz raised his eyebrows.

 

 

 

The door flew open and May entered.

"What do you think you're doing?" she asked. "Spinning the others some crap to get us to trust you again?"

"I was telling the truth," Ward said, standing up and meeting her gaze.

"We both know you weren't," she shot back.

Ward searched his mind for anything he could say to appease her, he knew if he did have to fight her again, he would not win…again.

"May," Ward said slowly, not realising how truthful the words actually were until after he'd said them. "Garrett is  _dead_ , the only people I have left now are all of you and I am not going to throw that away,"

"You were berating yourself about not following his orders ten minutes ago after everyone else had left, you've even admitted it, you feel guilty about betraying him; how can we trust someone who still misses someone from Hydra?"

"Is this the same treatment you gave Fitz," Ward demanded, knowing that out of all of the team, Fitz had been the most reluctant to admit that they had been betrayed. "What about Sk-" his words cut off as May punched him in the jaw.

"I don't know why you're still here, as you said, Garrett's dead, there's no getting him back Ward, but I want you gone,"

"Coulson's not going to just let me go," Ward pointed out.

"He couldn't get any information out of you, you know, I think he feels sorry for you, but thing is Ward, I don't," she threatened, slamming him into the desk before he had time to defend himself, he wasn't sure if he would have done anyway, fighting May wouldn't have got him back into the team's good books. Ignoring the crunching sound and Ward's barely concealed yell of pain, she turned to the incredibly furious Buddy, who barked and leaped towards her in order to sink his teeth into her arm, and knocked the dog out, if it was true that he really was Asgardian, he would be fine.

May turned to Ward, who was looking at Buddy in horror, but at the same time gasping for air, collapsed on the floor and clutching his chest in agony. She frowned, wondering what Ward was trying to pull before he started frantically coughing up blood. If May was the type to show her emotions she would have looked shocked and slightly guilty for what she had done, but instead she gritted her teeth in frustration and pressed her com. "Coulson," she explained calmly. "Ward has a punctured lung and is in an extremely critical condition. Send Trip and Simmons,  _now_ ,"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for the kudos, please leave a comment/kudos/etc.


	8. Hospitalised

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, I kind of tend to forget that I have an ao3 account and when I remember I am busy. I am going to try to remember to upload it here too whenever I add it to fanfiction.net as well!  
> Thanks for all the kudos and the bookmark (also the comments, but I've already replied to them) and for everyone for sticking around and reading this story for so long, even with my weird updating timings.  
> Also, as I said on ff.net...  
> Okay, I'm gonna point out here that I know literally nothing about how to deal with a punctured/collapsed lung as I didn't really spend that long researching it, so sorry about that! Also, I think my Britishness (is that even a proper word? Well, according to Ward it is, anyway…), is fairly obvious in this chapter :|

"What happened?" Simmons pressed, staring down at Ward's unconscious and wheezing form in dread. She didn't like the man, but it didn't mean she wanted him to die.

"I pushed him into the desk, it forced his one or more of his broken ribs inwards and he can't breathe,"

"What!" she yelled. "Trip, I need you to get me a breathing tube,"

"Already got one," Fitz announced, running into the room and giving it to the biochemist, hovering round her shoulder anxiously as she inserted it into his mouth.

"We better hope that his remaining lung can take in enough oxygen to avoid brain damage or placing him in a coma," Simmons explained to Fitz while Skye, Triplett and Coulson rushed into the interrogation room in quick succession.

"Ward's stable at the moment, but he's still in a critical condition and we can't treat him here," Simmons ordered. "We need to move him to the nearest hospital as soon as possible or he might not make it,"

"On it," Skye said, he fingers flying over her phone. "We're twenty miles away from Massachusetts General Hospital,"

"Pass," Trip yelled, already halfway out of the room, she threw her phone towards him and he caught it easily, looking at the map whilst flying towards the cockpit, mentally plotting the course.

They landed five minutes later and rushed Ward towards the hospital on a stretcher, the receptionist looked up at them in alarm.

"HI, I'm Agent Coulson from the CIA," he lied, holding up a fake ID. "One of my team has been injured by a terrorist, he has a punctured lung and is in a critical condition, he must be treated  _now_."

The receptionist looked at Ward in concern and unconcealed panic and picket up the phone.

"I need an emergency response team in reception now; a man has a punctured lung and needs to be taken to surgery  _immediately,_ " she turned back to Coulson and the team. "What's his name,"

There was silence for a few seconds during which the agents tried to think up a name which wouldn't cause anyone problems later.

"John Doe," Skye said convincingly. "He's an Amnesia patient, he's with us as we were hoping that something could trigger his memory,"

The woman nodded and typed something in on the computer. The surgeons came rushing towards them, taking the stretcher out of Fitz, Skye and Coulson's hands and placing it quickly on a hospital bed.

"We'll do everything we can," a doctor told them before Ward was rolled down the corridor and out of sight, the double doors swinging shut behind him.

The room was deathly quiet.

"He's going to be okay, isn't he?" Fitz asked, looking distraught.

A.O.S

Two hours later and Skye, Fitz, Simmons, Coulson and May were still sitting in the reception area. So far there had been no news on Ward's condition and they refused to answer Fitz's, Skye's and even Coulson's questions on the matter. Simmons looked pale and worried, upset even though earlier she had made it quite clear that she didn't like Ward at all. Fitz and Skye were shooting glares at May every so often(Coulson was refraining from doing the same), who zoned out and appeared to stare at the depressing hospital message board, purposefully ignoring the looks that they sent her way and wishing that she could do tai-chi in the hospital waiting room and not get chucked out.

Triplett had offered to take Buddy to the nearby vets, to check if he was alright after his incident with May and to remove his fleas.

"He doesn't deserve to die," Skye whispered out of the blue, fiddling with her nails and staring dejectedly down at the floor.

"Don't you say that, don't you  _dare_  say that!" Fitz muttered angrily at her. "He's gonna be fine, you'll see,"

She shrugged. "We don't know that," she whispered. "I mean why haven't they told us anything yet?"

"Look, we're just all going to have to remain calm, and stay positive, okay?" Jemma said as soothingly and fake brightly as she could.

Just then Coulson's mobile rang, breaking the icy atmosphere.

"Hello?" he answered.

"Hi Coulson," Trip called. "We have a problem. They've taken Buddy's blood,"

"Ward's not going to be pleased," Coulson stated grimly.

"So what's the news on him?" asked Trip.

"Nothing, as of yet,"

"I didn't even know they were going to take his blood," he complained. "I guess it should have been obvious, but they only gave me his medical form afterwards. What should I do, what if Buddy has a dangerous disease and if they don't analyse it we won't know?"

"What we agreed before should still stand," Coulson decided. "It's Ward's dog and it should be his decision to make if we are going to have any chance of him ever fully trusting us,"

"I could steal the blood and delete the records off the computer," Trip offered. "But I'll need Skye to talk me through it,"

"Yeah, okay, I'll hand you over," Coulson agreed and passed his phone over to Skye. "He needs to hack a computer," he explained, Skye nodded and took the phone outside, glad of the distraction.

A short while later a nurse came through the doors with a small smile on her face.

"Is he okay?" Coulson asked quickly before Fitz could even open his mouth.

She nodded. "He's still fast asleep due to the anaesthesia, and won't be available for visits for a while, however he seems okay. If you need the details of the operation they will be available in a couple of hours,"

Coulson nodded. "Thank you," he said and the team smiled in relief, Fitz the widest.

"What happened?" Skye questioned hopefully, re-entering the building.

They all looked at her happily and she sank into a chair, sighing in relief.

"I am going to look over the medical report when I can, but what the nurse said seemed promising," Simmons told her.

"So, when do we get to see him?" Skye enquired.

"Not for a while yet," Fitz said sadly.

"Are you kidding!" Skye exclaimed. "Hydra are still out there, we should be his personal bodyguards or something!"

Coulson smiled. "Go ahead, although be prepared for some very stubborn hospital staff," He tossed her a badge. "Remember, Agent Skye, CIA," she nodded and he turned to May. "Can I speak to you for a moment?" he asked, and she nodded, proving that she was still actually aware of her surroundings.

They got up and walked along random corridors, stopping in a seemingly empty area next to a vending machine on the fourth floor.

A.O.S

"Where is Ward anyway?" Fitz asked, pointing out that as they hadn't been shown to him yet, they had no idea of where the specialist was located.

"No problem," Skye replied quietly, looking around warily. "Hacking the CCTV feed…now, and I am in…" she flicked through the lines of code and pictures on her phone. "Ward is there…hey, he has a lock on his door!"

"What?" Fitzsimmons chorused and rushed round behind Skye so they could look at her phone too.

"Why would they have a lock on his door?" Fitz said nervously.

"I'm getting his file up, give me a second. "John Doe, Floor 1, room 36b, okay, it's apparently just because he's an amnesia patient and apparently they get confused and have a habit of running away, looks like they weren't taking chances with Ward because he's 'CIA',"

"Okay…" Simmons said uncertainly. "Well, how do we get the door to unlock?"

"Well, the lock seems to be controlled from that room there, I could probably make a wireless bug to scramble the curcuits and keep the door unlocked," Skye decided. "However… the room appears to control the CCTV cameras as well and it would probably knock those out too, which shouldn't be a problem…nothing else seems to be being controlled from that room so all of the patients are safe…just give me a few minutes to put the code in,"

The two scientists watched in fascination as Skye typed, writing line after line of the programme, then rechecking her work and correcting any errors. "Okay, this should work," she told the duo. "However because this is on my phone, the bug does have a catch if it gets too far out of range the connection will break and the power will come back on again. Also, we might take out some other power. Simmons, do you mind staying here with my phone? "

"A bit," she protested.

"Please," Fitz begged. "You know patients aren't meant to be overwhelmed by too many people at once and you know that you don't like Ward very much either,"

"Okay," agreed Simmons reluctantly.

"Thanks," Skye smiled gratefully and pressed a button on her phone, before locking it. "The code is running, see you soon,"

A.O.S

Triplett had to admit that in all his years as a specialist, this was by no means the most difficult mission he had ever faced. It was a small vets, one vet and his apprentice, and the task shouldn't have been too hard to carry out, but the apprentice had only left the computer once in two hours and she was giving him funny looks, he wasn't meant to be there as Buddy was supposed to be staying overnight and he guessed she just thought him too far outside the stereotype to be an overprotective pet owner.

Thankfully though, he had some tiny explosives in his pockets and there were no cameras, so, during one of his visits to check on Buddy, he attached one to the cage that four very loud and energetic birds shared and waited until the vet went upstairs to check on them to detonate the explosives, causing the cage door to swing open and chaos to ensue.

"I need your help, now!" the vet yelled frantically down to the apprentice, who rolled her eyes and jumped off her chair unenthusiastically to help. "And bring a padlock!"

Trip knew he didn't have long, but fortunately he had had Skye as a teacher so finding and deleting the results, the back-ups of the results and removing all traces of Buddy wasn't a problem. Until he heard the slamming of the cage door and the sound of a lock clicking into place that was.

Deciding quickly, he leapt over the desk and threw open the door to the vet's room, making a leeway for where he saw that the blood was being kept. "Buddy, Buddy, Buddy," he muttered, scanning down the rows. "Gotcha," he finished, opening the door and taking the blood out.

"What are you doing?" the vet asked, standing in the doorway behind him. When Trip found he couldn't think of an excuse the vet continued. "I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to leave if you're going to mess with my equipment,"

"Okay sure," Trip replied, walking calmly past him, before veering suddenly off to the left and rushing up the stairs towards the room where Buddy was kept in.

"Hey!" the man yelled but Trip ignored him, rushing to the kennel, using another of his devices to blow up the lock and picking up the still slightly dazed, but amiable, Buddy and heading towards the fire escape.

"What's wrong with you?" the apprentice asked as he climbed down the ladder Buddy over his shoulder. "Are you crazy or something?"

"Or something," Trip muttered. Walking quickly over to his car, he put Buddy in the boot and drove slowly, to ensure Buddy didn't freak out, towards the hospital.

A.O.S

"Why?" Coulson asked May.

She stared at him inscrutably.

"Why did you do it?" he repeated. "You knew Ward was injured, and if you were going to interrogate him you should have at least asked my permission,"

"I was using my initiative," May replied coolly. "And you shouldn't trust him Coulson, it's going to be a mistake,"

"You should trust me, I'm better informed this time, I know what I'm doing,"

"Phil," she replied indifferently. "You should know that I'll always trust you, but not in this,"

 _And you obviously know I didn't mean for that to happen,_ she thought, stalking off down the corridor.


	9. Protection

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I remembered :)
> 
> Thanks for the kudos!
> 
> The receptionist is an OC, if there are any characters in the Marvel universe called Wires I don't know about them, I was just staring at my keyboard box trying to think of a name.
> 
> Also, I do talk about hell in this chapter, I'm not making any connotations to religion, but he thinks he's dead, so where's the logical place to be if he wakes up? I hope I haven't offended anyone.

Ward woke to the sound of incoherent mumbling and a strange numb sensation in his chest. His bed was strangely comfortable, were Hydra trying the nice technique now? Unless they had actually invented something to mess with his senses and he wasn't really lying on a soft mattress, his head supported by fluffy pillows and he didn't have a thick, warm blanket draped on top of him. When was the last time he had actually been  _warm_? The smell of antiseptic was strange though…antiseptic? Suddenly the events of the last couple of days came rushing back to Ward, he wasn't with Hydra, he had escaped with Fitz and Skye and had found Buddy, the dog he had believed to be dead…Buddy! What had May done to him? If he had rescued Buddy just to allow him to die, Ward did not want to think about it; Buddy had deserved to live out his possibly very long life.

 _What happened to me though?_ he asked himself.  _My ribs punctured my lungs, I was meant to die, hell seems pretty comfortable at the moment though; when am I going to get to the part where…_

"Skye look, his heart rate's speeding up, I think he's waking," Ward could hear Fitz talking excitedly, but he couldn't understand the meaning. It didn't make any sense, Fitz and Skye weren't meant to be in hell too, for one thing, they hadn't died, two, they were too nice to end up there.

Ward forced his eyes open, blinking furiously at the glaring light and trying to make sense of his surroundings.

"Yeah, he's awake," Skye agreed and Ward turned his head towards the sound of her voice. Skye was sitting in a chair next to the bed he was lying on, in what seemed to be a hospital room.

So, they had taken him into a hospital to heal him, but, why did they bother? Probably something to do with their consciences being too large, Skye was looking at him in concern, could she care about him? He didn't know, he had never been too great with human emotions; although he had learnt to sense anger and come up with a convincing lie from an early age, he'd never really understood people, he had learnt more about normal reactions to things at the Academy, but sometimes he still read things wrong. Like Coulson said, Skye still hated him, didn't she? Well, if she didn't, she was stupid, and Skye might be immature and irresponsible sometimes, but she wasn't stupid.

"How are you feeling?" Fitz asked.

"A little strange, where's Buddy?" Ward cut straight to the point, desperate to know what had befallen his first and only best friend.

"Trip's taken him to the vet's, but he seems alright," Fitz replied. "May hasn't done any lasting damage,"

Ward nodded, looking slightly more relieved, but not completely relaxed.

"But you'll need to give us more information than that, or Simmons is going to get mad," Fitz told him.

"Fine," Ward rolled his eyes. "I feel a little dizzy, but I'm not in pain, presumably from the painkillers you gave me during the operation…why am I in a hospital?" he asked, not being able to wait any longer.

"Because we didn't have the technology to heal you on the Bus so Simmons ordered for you to be taken here," Fitz explained, which confused Ward even more, he was pretty sure the biochemist hated him, but at the same time she was basically really nice and didn't have the heart in her to let anyone die.  _That may become a problem for her in the future,_ Ward thought,  _but I guess I'm glad that she's still a nice person._

"Why didn't you let May kill me?" Ward clarified.

"Because we care about you," Skye said, as if it should have been obvious, Ward's eyes widened at her complete one-eighty.

"Besides, I don't think she actually wanted to kill you…" Fitz reasoned, but trailed off when he saw both Ward and Skye's incredulous expressions. "She could have just wanted to hurt you, a lot…"

"You two shouldn't care about me," Ward tried to explain. "I betrayed you and I'm a horrible person who's done terrible things to innocent people,"

"Ward,  _everyone_  cares about you," Fitz contradicted. "May's still a bit pissed off, but she'll come round,"

"And you're  _not_  a horrible person," Skye put in.

"Really?" Ward smirked. "Because Coulson made it clear to me that no one on this team liked me, and I told you what I did to my younger brother Skye, and you've seen what I did with Hydra."

"So this is the incredibly worried Coulson who has kept trying not to yell at May all day then?" Fitz questioned. "Trust me Ward, he cares about you a lot, always has done,"

"I think that's why your betrayal hurt so much, because we all cared about you so much," Skye explained. "But now we know more about the situation, we understand, plus it wasn't really a betrayal anyway if you were with Garrett before you even joined SHIELD,"

"Skye, I could have lied about all that," he pointed out. "The one thing you know I did to you very well before was lie to you,"

"Stop trying to push us away," she smiled sadly, and wrapped her arms around him. His eyes widened and he stiffened at her touch, but in a few beats he relaxed into it, Fitz leaning towards the two to join the hug as well. "Because it won't work," she promised.

Then the lights went out and the sound of an explosion was heard.

**Five minutes earlier…**

Agent Melinda May strode past Simmons angrily, planning on going back to the plane and practising tai chi and beating the crap out of some inanimate object as soon as possible.

"I don't trust him either," Simmons called out to her and May swung round to face the young scientist.

"Why not?" she asked.

"Because he can't be trusted," Simmons answered simply. "He betrayed us before and is perfectly capable of doing it again. What if he actually manages to seriously hurt one of us this time? Maybe he's telling the truth, maybe he really needs a second chance,"

"But the others are letting off the hook too easily," May finished.

"Exactly," Simmons exclaimed. "They're just excusing him for what he did because he had a bad life, it doesn't mean he's not still evil,"

"What I like about Coulson is that he thinks everyone is redeemable, everyone deserves a second chance," May told her, he voice was mostly blank but held a hint of fondness and exasperation. "But sometimes I worry he takes that a little too far. He tried to be harsh to him at the beginning, but I guess he just couldn't do it,"

"I don't blame you for what you did," Simmons said. "I just wish you hadn't nearly killed him, I don't really want him to die,"

May nodded, seeming to agree with the young scientist.

Then the lights went out and the sound of an explosion was heard.

 

 

 

"What was that?" Ward asked as the three of them sprang instantly apart and looked around wildly.

"I don't know but, Ward what are you doing?" Fitz yelled in frustration to the specialist who was attempting to sit up and climb out of bed. "You just had an operation on your lungs,  _they need to heal!_ "

He sighed. "I know, but how am I meant to protect you from whatever's out there from here?" he questioned frantically.

"You don't have to," Skye replied. "You'll have to trust us to protect you this time. Anyway, you'll only get in the way if you try to fight and then find you can't breathe,"

Ward nodded grimly, lying down again unhappily.

 

 

 

Fitz and Skye stood adjacent to the door, backs against the wall and waiting silently, ICERs in hands.

A light tapping came from the window and the two nearly jumped out of their skins, pointing their guns towards a surprised Trip, who was standing outside.

"What the hell's happening here?" he questioned as he passed Buddy through the window and clambered in after him. Buddy bounded happily over to Ward as Triplett carefully scanned outside and slowly closed the window. "The whole west wing's been reduced to a pile of ash!"

"Fitz gently pushed Buddy away from Ward, the dog having been attempting to jump on top of the man, which wouldn't have done his broken ribs any good; so instead he placed his paws on the edge of Ward's pillow and whined.

"You're alright!" Ward exclaimed ecstatically, stroking the dog's left paw.

"What do you think happened?" Skye asked and Triplett looked at her curiously. "No one normal would blow up what I think are the pregnancy wards. We're clearly dealing with some psychos,"

"Can't we just hack the CCTV feed and see what's going on?" Trip asked.

"She disabled it," Fitz groaned. "We should probably go out and…"

A quick knock came again, this time from the door.

"Who is it?" Skye called.

"It's the receptionist," a woman replied. "I need to check on the patient,"

"Don't worry, I'm fine," Ward said loudly.

"Yeah, we're all in here and he's doing okay," Fitz explained. "You should probably go check on the other patients now, they'll probably be needing some answers!"

"Okay," she agreed, and the door came crashing down, the once seemingly nice receptionist now held a gun.

She shot Skye and Fitz in one swift move, before moving on to Trip, who disarmed her before she could shoot him too. He held his gun to her head.

"Don't move," he ordered and she smiled sweetly at him, then touched her wrist to his stomach, causing him to fly across the room and slam hard into the wall.

Ward muttered comforting words to Buddy and gripped the dog's new collar (courtesy of a pet shop) tightly, hoping that Buddy wouldn't do anything that would get the dog hurt.

"Hail Hydra," the woman introduced. "I'm Agent Wires and I'm afraid that your interrogation didn't go according to plan last time. That's a nice dog,  _Buddy_ , isn't he?"

"Yes," Ward replied icily. "What did you do to them?"

"Those two should be okay, just in a lot of pain for a few weeks, exactly like we promised," she smirked. "And that one should be fine, providing he hasn't sustained any brain damage from the wall. Coulson, well, I think he died when we blew up the west wing, pity really, he probably knew some stuff; and around two dozen agents are engaging in combat with Agents May and Simmons, there's no one to 'protect' you,"

She picked her gun up off the ground and pointed it at Buddy, Ward was still reeling with worry for his teammates, and loss, for Coulson, but he barely felt any of that compared with the panic he felt for Buddy when he saw the gun pointed at the dog's head.

"No, no,  _please,_ " he begged, not caring that pleading with anyone like this was a weakness. "Don't shoot him, please, god  _no_ , I'll do  _anything,_ I'll  _tell_ you  _anything,_ I  _swear_ I will! Just  _don't_ kill him!"

She looked down at him in fake pity and waved the gun around, pausing casually on Ward and Buddy in turn.

"I think we've discovered your weakness," she smirked and he nodded. "Oh, is the poor little  _specialist_  crying?" she said spitefully and he blinked rapidly in shock. He never cried, not ever, not in a long time anyway, but here he was, unshed tears building up in his eyes and threating to roll down his cheeks.

"You'd better be able to walk," she told Ward commandingly and he nodded, trying to sit up and swing himself out of bed.

"When you leave here, you'd better  _not_  be able to," Melinda May said icily, standing in the doorway, a broken IV pole in her hands.

The receptionist swore and shot a bullet towards her, but May dodged it easily, then used the IV pole as a javelin to knock the gun out of her hand.

"You killed Coulson," she stated, advancing towards the woman menacingly.

"That wasn't me…that was…" Wires tried to think of an excuse but failed, freaking out under the piercing eyes of the cavalry.

" _You're_  in charge of the Hydra division in this hospital and  _you_ killed him," Melinda practically shrieked and Ward had to marvel at the loss of the pilot's usually calm demeanour.

May slammed Wires into the wall and proceeded to mercilessly punch the woman senseless.

"May!" a voice from the doorway yelled, but she ignored it, completely focused on her task. " _May,_ " it repeated and she swung round, letting the unconscious body of the Hydra Agent drop to the floor and staring at Phil Coulson, standing in the ragged remains of his suit, covered in cuts and dirt, with Simmons leaning awkwardly, using his shoulder to try and stay upright, her ankle clearly broken or sprained.

 


	10. The Well

"Fitz!" Jemma cried, hopping towards the unconscious man. "He's still breathing," she smiled at Coulson in relief, before moving over to Skye.

"Trip should be fine too," Coulson observed, leaning over him and checking his pulse. "Are all of the remaining Hydra Agents taken care of?" he asked May.

She nodded. "I think so, but I should probably go and check everywhere is still secure,"

"I'll call 911," Coulson added. "We'll need police and extra medical support after this,"

 

 

 

They had been at the hospital for a week before the inevitable next problem occurred. It had been a steady stream of pain meds (for Skye and Fitz), bandages and casts (for most of them) and questions from the authorities.

The team were hanging out in Ward's room, well, what had been Ward's, now it was more like everybody's; the hospital was incredibly busy and there wasn't much space. Plus the CIA had temporarily commandeered the Bus, the Agents they sent round to investigate the impersonation charges were unsurprisingly old friends of Coulson's and they agreed to gloss over what they had done, if they could take the plane for a spin on their own missions for a while. It wasn't really a problem, only May and Buddy were really fit for travel anyway.

"I'm sorry for bringing you here," Coulson apologised when the room was empty for once.

"Why?" Ward asked whilst running a hand through the sleeping Buddy's fur.

"You must have realised where we are by now," he continued.

"Of course," Ward confirmed nonchalantly. "I'd prefer not to be here but you didn't have a choice in which hospital you sent me to if you didn't want me to die,"

This was still a fact which Ward was finding hard to believe, he would have thought it were a trick if it wasn't for the fact that they definitely weren't lying. Of course he still had an eternity to go if he ever wanted to prove himself trustworthy and he still had his own trust issues which he needed to iron out, he had always found it hard to trust people, but he did feel a lot safer than ever before when he was with the team and Buddy.

"And we can't really leave with Skye and Fitz in this state can we?" Ward pointed out.

"If you ever have problems you will tell us though?" Coulson queried and Ward confirmed. "Good, I'll be back but Talbot's been demanding even more pointless questions which apparently I have to waste even more time answering,"

"Goodbye sir," Ward said and Coulson stroked Buddy (whom he was growing increasingly fond of) and left.

Ward sat quietly, an idea which he had supressed in the back of his mind now slowly starting to take hold.

 

 

 

One week later and the plane had been returned. Fitz was still in a bit of pain but Skye had stopped hurting completely on the ninth day, both she and Coulson suspected it had something to do with her 0-8-4 powers or lasting effects of GH-325. Trip's concussion was getting better, and although he was ordered not to put too much strain on his lungs, Ward's ribs were no longer too much of a danger and Simmons's ankle was healing nicely.

There was just one problem; they were scheduled to leave in the morning and the plan hadn't left him, only grown over time.

 

 

 

He was back in his bunk in the Bus, after all he hadn't killed them during the last two weeks and if he wanted to, everyone, sans May and Simmons (who found that arguing was pointless), agreed that him sleeping in the interrogation room wouldn't make much difference, only hinder them if they needed to take someone in who was actually loyal to Hydra.

This only worked to his advantage.

Gesturing to Buddy to keep silent he opened his door quietly and slipped across to the mission briefing area to open the cargo hold, and after making Buddy stay upstairs, sneaked out into the night.

Although Ward had spent half of his life away from this place and had done his best to forget everything, fifteen years had imprinted this area in his brain.

The night air was cool and the journey down the country lane would have been pleasant, if he hadn't been filled with an overwhelming sense of dread.

Half an hour later and Ward's increasingly snail like pace had led him to the ruins of an old house. Once tall, imposing and frightening, it now lay in burnt ruins, an eerie silhouette in the glow of the night sky.

 

 

 

Skye knocked on Coulson's office door, holding her tablet and becoming increasingly impatient.

"What is it?" the Director asked, standing in the doorway, wearing his Captain America pyjamas.

"I programmed Ward's bracelet to set off an alarm if he was ever a mile away from the plane," she explained. Ward had been issued with his own silver bracelet at May's insistence, but Skye couldn't help admitting that she did feel just a bit safer knowing that he had it on his wrist. Honestly it helped everyone sleep better too.

"He's probably gone to his parent's house," Coulson inferred. "Can you go after him? I don't want to invade his privacy but I'd feel a bit better if someone else was with him, I think he'd prefer you over anyone else,"

Skye nodded, Ward was moving pretty slowly and she should be able to catch up with him in about ten minutes, thanks to intensive field training with May. She was also pretty glad that she hadn't actually gone to bed properly that night, she'd just surfed the internet, and hadn't been asleep when the alarm had sounded, it would have been annoying to follow him in pyjamas.

 

 

 

When she arrived at the house everything was quiet, everything was dark, not to mention severely creepy, but Ward was nowhere to be seen.

"Coulson, where is he?" she whispered, but got no reply, then she remembered that she'd taken her com out earlier, damn, it had felt like it was still in her ear.

Well, the house looked pretty dangerous and she hoped that Ward wouldn't be climbing around in there so she decided that she may as well start with the overgrown garden. The incredibly massive garden which was part of the presumably formerly grand house. She almost felt jealous of Ward, before she remembered what his childhood was actually like.

There was a figure standing at the opposite end of the garden so she made her way past an old well and quietly over, not wanting to startle the specialist by yelling.

"Ward," she greeted when she was just a few paces away.

"Yeah," the man answered, but his voice was much deeper and more threatening. "What do you want?"

"Uh, oh, sorry," Skye apologised. "I was actually looking for someone else but..."

"But you said my name," the man interrupted, taking a step towards her. "What do you want, who's looking, the drugs are due tomorrow, so who are you? I warn you, it has  _always_  been very hard to get lies past me,"

Skye's blood ran cold, but she steeled herself; drawing to conclusions wouldn't help, right? She weighed her options; she could demand to know where  _Grant_  Ward was, which would risk giving him away if this Ward didn't know where he was and she didn't really want Ward to have to fight anyone with his ribs still healing. Of course there was always the chance that he wasn't here at all, he could have glanced at the house and moved on to the cemetery, Skye couldn't know after stupidly leaving her com on the Bus.

"They sent me to tell you that the drugs wouldn't be available until the day after yesterday and sorry for the setback. However if you harm me in any way, you won't be getting the drugs at all,"

This Ward did not look impressed. "Why are you trespassing on my property?" he yelled and advanced towards her.

"Why are  _you_  here?" she deflected, trying to buy some time. "Maynard Ward, right? You're meant to be in prison for drug dealing,"

"This house belongs to me now, and kid, I decided this is the perfect place to hide everything. Unfortunately, you're still trespassing and I can't risk you causing the cops so..."

"Should have brought an ICER," Skye muttered under her breath as she sprinted towards the gates, but it was in vain, Maynard was faster. All the moves she had learned from May and Ward were nothing compared to his brute strength and bone crushing grip as he slammed her into the wall of the old well, and leaned her backwards, slightly over the edge.

"Why are you here?" he hissed in her ear.

"Let her go!" Ward shouted, moving quickly closer to the two.

Maynard glanced towards the new arrival and shoved Skye backwards.

Her echoing scream mirrored Ward's strangled cry.

"Skye!" he yelled as he launched himself at Maynard.

"What are you doing on my property...Grant?" his brother smiled maliciously in recognition as he twisted Ward's arm behind his back and grabbed his hair at the same time.

Ward aimed a kick at Maynard's knee, then used the distraction to elbow the man in the shoulder, before twisting round and kicking him in the stomach.

"Skye, are you okay?" he called down.

"I'm fine, I just hit my head on the way down and I'm feeling a bit dizzy and -"

Grant cried out in pain as Maynard punched him and sent him flying to the ground. He started coughing violently, a massive pain in his chest and Maynard's foot was on his wrist before he had time to react. "I thought I told you, you should always watch your back," The bone cracked loudly though the otherwise still night. "You shouldn't have allowed your feelings to get in the way…She'll die Grant," Maynard promised, running his foot along Ward's arm to his elbow. "She'll die, just like Dana did, and you can't stop it," Ward's vision blurred as he tried to push Maynard's foot off his broken elbow, but he found he couldn't, not at the angle he was forced to lie in. "I don't know why you came back, tell me, did you miss me, Grant? But I swear to you, you'll regret it,"


	11. Drowning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And you guys have finally caught up to the same chapter as on ff.net!  
> Thanks for the kudos and the bookmark :)  
> Also some relevant trivia, apparently Maynard's name has been changed to Christian, and he's appearing in episode 6 this season (why does time have to drag so slowly!)

"No, you will," Grant replied, trying to figure out what manoeuvres he could use to get himself out of the situation. He had always been pleased with his ability to think clearly in all circumstances, unfortunately when it came to Skye this was not generally the case. It was a pity, he mused, he had tried not to, but whenever Ward had pictured meeting his brother again he had always imagined making Maynard pay for what he had done.

Then he remembered that he always tried to never go anywhere unarmed, he'd managed to sneak a scalpel from the lab earlier.  _This is what fear_   _does to you_ , he reminded himself,  _it makes you forget important details. If I want to be a specialist again, I have to regain control of my emotions._

He pulled out the scalpel and threw it at what he was sure was Maynard's leg.

His childhood tormentor gave a yell of pain and fell backwards. Before Maynard had time to react Ward leapt up and punched Maynard in the head; he crumpled to the ground.

Seeing stars, Ward stared frantically down the deep dark abyss that had featured regularly in his nightmares since touching the Berserker staff.

"Skye, are you still there?" he shouted.

"Yes," she replied weakly, coughing violently. Ward searched his mind back to what he'd seen in his investigation of the house and grounds earlier.

"Give me a minute," he told her and raced towards the greenhouse. The door was already broken and the majority of its contents ransacked, however it seemed that no robbers had had the need for the old rope hanging on the wall. Ward wasn't sure if it would hold Skye's weight, it was more than slightly damaged, however he also knew that Skye wouldn't be able to last much longer.

"Skye, can you catch this and wrap it around yourself?" he demanded.

"I think so," she sputtered. "But I'm so cold, I don't think I can keep going for much longer,"

"You're going to have to," Grant muttered, tying the rope in a knot one handed, and throwing it down to her. It bounced off her head and landed with a splash in the water beside her; she threw it over her head and let it sit under her arms, her movements were jerky and slow, and he could hear her teeth chattering, the frightening sound echoing off the walls.

"Skye, you're going to have to use the walls to push yourself up, I don't know if I'll have the strength to pull you up with only one of my arms," he told her, tying the other end of the rope around his waist and gripping it with his left arm. "Ready?"

Skye made a noise, presumably in affirmation and he began to pull, Skye tried to push herself up on the walls with her hands and feet, but was exhausted and even with the adrenalin surge could barely move. The sides were slippery, and cut into her hands as well as leaving long, bloody scratches down her arms and grazes on her legs through her now ripped jeans.

Ward pulled as hard as he could, he could not, he would never, let Skye die too, he couldn't let that happen. He used all the strength he could possibly muster and eventually, after what seemed like forever, he saw a hand wreathed in shadow appear over the top of the side. He yanked on the rope harder and she managed to hang precariously over the edge.

"Come on!" Ward urged, fear obscuring everything else, the pain, the exhaustion, the confusion.

She shook her head. "I don't think…" Ward caught her a second before she fell back over the edge wrapping his good arm around her tightly, and moving her gently away from the danger, laying her carefully down on the floor.

Skye wasn't breathing and he was sure his heart stopped beating as he stared down at her lifeless form. Her body had clearly suffered from cold shock and concussion and her lungs were giving up after swallowing so much water.

"No, Skye, no!" Ward cried out, placing his hands over her heart. He'd never actually had to perform CPR before, one of the benefits to being a specialist was that you worked alone and only had to care about yourself, but he'd been trained to be able to do it, so he hoped it would be enough.

She turned her head to the side and began coughing up water. Ward breathed a sigh of relief.

"Skye, Skye," he hissed, shaking her gently, she remained unresponsive, but he could still hear her laboured breathing.

The thrumming of an engine could be heard in the distance, slowly starting to get louder, but it didn't matter to Ward much, his attention on Skye was too great. But then the vehicle started coming down the road, its lights flashing through the trees.

Ward tensed as the car stopped outside the gate and five figures got out. He wasn't sure if he could move Skye, or even how far he could move her before the people, most likely Maynard's drug gang, could find them.

"Ward!" A Scotsman yelled, and Ward tried to drag Skye back to the relative safety of behind the well.

Wait, that sounded like Fitz.

"Fitz!" Ward shouted. "Quickly, Skye's been injured, she stopped breathing, I had to do CPR, but she's freezing and had inhaled a lot of water and I'm not sure if she's going to be alright, please, help her!"

"I have a med kit!" Simmons yelled. "Ward, I'm going to need you to move out the way. Fitz, Coulson, May, bring torches, and Trip, carry the stretcher,"

She was by his side in a matter of moments and immediately taking care of the situation, the scene illuminated by the bright lights of the SHIELD issue torches.

"What happened here?" Fitz asked, taking in both Maynard and Skye's unconscious bodies.

" _He_ was here," Ward explained venomously. "He pushed her into the well because she was trespassing and because I tried to stop him!"

"May, tie him up and lock him in the trunk," Coulson ordered, pointing at Maynard and attempting to take control of the situation.

She nodded and used the rope to create an intricate binding around the man, one that he wouldn't escape from unless he was Houdini.

"How did you know to come here?" Ward questioned in bewilderment.

"Skye had her com in her pocket," Fitz explained. "It was off, but it still set off a warning when it was submerged in water,"

Ward had never been more glad of one of Fitz's inventions in his life.

"I've called the hospital, what now?" May demanded.

"When they arrive, tell them the assailant got away. I want to bring him in for questioning?"

"So basically like Quinn?" Fitz asked.

"Exactly like Quinn," Coulson confirmed.

The ambulance arrived a minute later and the medics immediately surrounded Skye.

"Fitz, Triplett and May, go back to the bus," Coulson delegated. "The rest of us will go to the hospital,"

The trip to the hospital was long and agonising. Skye seemed stable, but even though Fitz hadn't received any permanent damage, Ward had not known this when he'd escaped from SHIELD, only that Fitz was in a critical condition after nearly drowning, so he'd antagonised himself by what happens when the brain is deprived of oxygen before Hydra had captured him for information. So now he knew  _a lot_ about the effects of a near drowning experience. And in no way was it remotely comforting.

When they reached the hospital, Skye was carted away on a hospital bed, leaving Ward staring after her, feeling that everything was all his fault. Once again, he'd been unable to protect someone that he cared about.

"Statistically, she should be okay," Simmons said, to herself as much as anyone. "Of course the…"

"Simmons, shut up," Coulson said as politely as possible and the three of them lapsed into silence, the scene of only a few weeks earlier in the same reception area implanted in their brain.

"Ward, what happened to your arm?" Simmons asked, noticing for the first time the odd angle at which his arm hung and the dark bruising visible on his wrist before his arm disappeared into his leather jacket.

"Maynard broke it," he replied. "It will be fine, he's broken my arm a lot before, I set it correctly on the ride to the hospital,"

Simmons and Coulson practically marched Ward over to the desk.

"Where's the ER?" Simmons demanded. "He needs and x-ray as soon as possible, please,"

Ward rolled his eyes at Simmons's reaction, they really should have been worrying about Skye, but didn't complain. It wasn't as if he could talk either of them out of it, and if he was truly honest, he liked the fact that these people cared about him, even though he wasn't sure he deserved it.

 

 

 

May, Triplett and Simmons sat side by side on the holotable, looking at the feed from the interrogation room that was currently appearing on the screen. They were only half watching really, most of their thought process was spent cursing Maynard, wondering if Skye was okay and snacking on Fitz's big bowl of popcorn, because even field agents need comfort food once in a while.

"He's woken up," May observed, anger flashing beneath her eyes.

"Good," Fitz said, sliding off the table with conviction and making his way towards the sliding doors.

"Where are you going?" Trip questioned.

"To question him. Ruthlessly," the scientist replied.

"Let me," May frowned, following Fitz to the base of the stairs.

"No, I want to do this," he told her and made his way towards Grant Ward's brother.

He couldn't let the man get away with what he had done.

 


	12. The Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Quite sadistic descriptions of child abuse. If you feel unable to read this sort of things, please skip to about 2/3 of the way down the page because seriously, Maynard is not a nice person. (also, brief mention of a suicide attempt, and drug use)
> 
> Incredibly sorry for the late update, real life and terrible writers block got in the way (plus this chapter was quite difficult to write, but I was unwilling to change the storyline)
> 
> Story so far: Maynard (Ward's older brother) pushes Skye down a well. Ward gets injured but stops him and saves Skye. Maynard is in SHIELD custody and Skye and Ward are at the hospital. Fitz decides to question Maynard.

"They sent  _you_ to interrogate me?" Maynard laughed incredulously, glancing up as the engineer walked into the room and closed the door behind him.

"No, I volunteered," Fitz corrected coldly and Maynard shot him a patronising glance. "Because Wa- Grant and Skye are my friends and you hurt them,"

"So? They deserved it,"

"No they didn't," replied Fitz, trying to keep his voice even.

"What is this place, it's a little high tech for the police,"

"A secure SHIELD facility that you won't be escaping from,"

"Oh, do you think you're some kind of spy then? Did you dream of being a secret agent, well how's that working out for you, you're clearly some weak spineless mummies boy, no wonder SHIELD fell to Hydra, are they are all like you?"

"I have some tricks up my sleeve," Fitz assured him.

"Like what?" Maynard snorted.

"Do you know what an ICER is," Fitz asked, pulling out the night-night gun, and analysing Maynard's expression. "Just think about what the name suggests, as I really don't think you want to,"

"I can tell why Ward likes you," Maynard offered. "You're just like him, stupid, thinking that words will get you somewhere because you're too weak to admit that the only thing that will work on someone is a good punch,"

"So would you like me to punch you then, or I could bring May in to do it. You obviously can't punch anyone as you're handcuffed to a table. But I warn you the last person she was let loose on she practically pulverised,"

"A woman?" he smirked and Fitz could practically feel May's thoughts of condescension. "Who was she let loose on?"

"Yeah," Fitz clarified. "And you're going to regret saying that at some point. Now tell me about Ward,"

Maynard grinned maliciously.

"He's always been weak, worthless, he would always mess up. He deserved everything he got, he's lucky everyone went so easy on him really,"

Glancing across to Fitz he noticed that the scientist had paled slightly, although he was doing his best to remain stoic.  _I'm getting to him, good, time to elaborate._

"When I was born, I was strong, like a man, and my father, he was  _proud_  of me, but then Grant came along. He was always so needy, cried all the time, especially when he was punished for not doing as he was told. He'd never learn, so my parents decided he wasn't worth it, except to beat him on occasion, so I took it upon myself to educate him

"The Dana came along and God, he was even more of a crying, pathetic wimp than Grant! The kid was a lost cause from the start, and Grant, he cared about the brat so much, I could just tell," Maynard sighed, shaking his head slightly in disappointment. "All my work was coming undone, Grant started developing a nasty habit of disobeying me, he always used to try and play stupid little games with the kid, argue why I  _needed_  to give them food, so do you know what I did?" Maynard asked, a twisted smile on his face. Fitz shook his head, although he really didn't want to hear more, he figured he probably needed to know the truth about Grant. "I made him do it instead,

"Every time Dana did something wrong, and sometimes when he didn't, just to keep them on their toes and make sure they knew I was in charge, I'd make Grant hurt him,"

"But Ward wouldn't…"

"Oh he did," Maynard assured him, his eyes gleaming. "Of course he was reluctant at first but he soon discovered that the punishments would be far more severe, both for him and his brother, if he refused to do as I asked,

"Those were the good times," he grinned reminiscently. "Want to know anything else?"

"What did the punishments contain?" Fitz questioned slowly, with an air of uncertainty, feeling like he was going to throw up.

"I'm glad you asked," he began. "Well, they were usually beatings, however I locked them inside a lot of cupboards too, there were quite a few of those in our house, real spooky ones. They used to get really scared after a while and used to scream and cry and hurl themselves at the doors, but mom and dad got very cross with them, and I think they preferred the cold, dark cupboards to their wrath," he laughed. "Usually I'd find them curled up in a ball in the middle of the floor whimpering after I'd left them there for a day or two. They'd become very compliant after that, the constant darkness and lack of food and water was terrifying for them, they'd do exactly as I said,

"I left Dana in a cupboard for a few days, probably too long, when Grant smashed the lock to try to give him water the brat was delirious. Still, Grant shouldn't have broken the boy out, so I left them outside in the snow that night, told them to drink melted icicles. They had to go to hospital as they were ill for a while after that, but, they got what was coming to them, I'm glad I did it, even if dad was furious for the press nearly finding out. Besides, a real man would have found a way to keep warm, it wasn't my fault they weren't prepared, they would have found it if they weren't both such failures,"

Fitz gripped the arms of the chair so hard his knuckles went white.

"Sometimes I'd destroy their possessions in front of them, to prove to them that I controlled everything in their lives. If they ever dared fight back I'd drown them," Maynard exclaimed joyfully, leaning across the table towards Fitz, who shrank back without realising it. "I used to tie them up, run a bowl of cold water in the sink, shove their head inside and watch them struggle.

"They'd get desperate of course, I could only hold their head and arms in place and they'd frantically kick me. But I'd make sure that for every kick I got, Dana would get five and Grant would get ten in return,"

Fitz was furious by now, but was determined not to show it, even though he wasn't succeeding very well.

"Of course that was when the problem started," Maynard elaborated. "Grant had just started middle school, the same one as I went to, and unfortunately he had begun to make friends. I told him to meet me by the old well and I'd teach him what would happen if he ever even contemplated disobeying me again. The kid hid, he was so weak and afraid, so, as the coward didn't show I went for Dana instead. Grant came running out to save him when he heard him screaming, but unfortunately, it was too late and Dana drowned. It was Grant's fault obviously, if he had been less of a worthless piece of shit and taken the punishment, Dana wouldn't have died,"

"You  _killed_ your brother!" Fitz yelled.

"I he wasn't meant to die, and Grant could swim, I'd shoved him down there before, so if it had been the other way around, clearly, they would have both survived if he wasn't so much of a wimp,"

"He didn't believe that did he?" Fitz asked incredulously.

"Of course he did, he attempted to drown himself, but I wasn't going to let him off that lightly, he didn't deserve it. I told him if he tried it again, I'd leave Rose, our little sister, in there for an hour,"

Fitz glared at him.

"Honestly, I think he welcomed the punishments after what he'd done," Maynard smirked. "How are you holding up?"

"Fine," the scientist replied through gritted teeth. "Get on with it,"

"You really want me to continue?" Maynard laughed sarcastically. "Okay then, seeing as you're clearly enjoying this so much. "After Dana died, that's when the fun could really begin. I only had one sibling, whose mental state was seriously unstable, half the time he'd do whatever I said, the other times he'd be screaming and fighting and rebelling, to concentrate on now. My mom said Rose was off limits most of the time. The bitch wanted to play happy families with the little girl and stayed in her drugged up dream, rarely letting Rose out of her sight. It was funny really, she was completely high, she didn't even realise her actions hurt Rose. She wasn't really capable of looking after the girl at all,

"I gave him one of mum's drugs once," Maynard frowned, and then his face broke into a smile. "God that was hilarious!"

Fitz got up and stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

May glanced up as Fitz walked into the room, listening closely she could hear him muttering. "I'm better than him, I'm better than him…" repeatedly.

"Yeah, you are," she agreed. "But I'm not, just say the word and…"

"No," Fitz shook his head. "We still need information out of him, plus I don't want to lower myself to his level, I don't think Ward would want that, I don't think Jemma would either,"

She nodded. "Trip's gone to the kitchen, he gave up watching five minutes ago,"

Fitz nodded, and left to find him.

 

 

 

Ward sat dejectedly beside Skye's bed, gazing down at her and stroking her hair with the hand that wasn't in the cast. Simmons was having a conversation about her treatment with the doctors and Coulson had left to find a quiet place where he could phone May.

Fitz opened the door and stalked in, dropping into the chair opposite Ward and folding his arms.

"What's wrong?" Ward asked the man who looked like a sulking toddler.

"I spoke to your brother," Fitz told him.

"Ah," Ward replied awkwardly, then after a pause added. "What did he say?"

"Stuff," Fitz replied morosely. "I don't wanna talk about it,"

Ward watched him closely as Fitz looked down and started twiddling his thumbs. "Okay,"

"When's Skye going to wake up?" Fitz asked after about ten minutes of dead silence.

"Soon, I think," Ward answered uncertainly. "If he's done anything to Skye I swear..."

"I'll kill him." Fitz interrupted darkly and Ward stared at him in confusion.

"Don't," Ward told him. "It's not worth it,"

"What Ward?" Fitz demanded. "I've already killed someone and if anyone else deserves to die it's your brother and  _you're_  worth it. Killing your brother won't give you satisfaction. It will just leave you hollow and empty. You can't kill him, honestly, it won't be justice for your brother,"

"You shouldn't have to kill him either," Ward pointed out. "You don't need any more red on your ledger,"

"Then we won't kill him, an eye for an eye won't erase the pain of his abuse and your loss, but it will help to be the better person,"

"As long as we put him somewhere he will never hurt anyone else again," Ward agreed.

Fitz nodded. "Especially you,"

"No," Ward corrected. "Especially  _you_  and  _Skye_ ,"

"He won't hurt any of us, I promise you Ward,"

"Oh yeah, what did he do to you?"

"Nothing!"

Simmons opened the door to find Fitz and Ward staring angrily at each other.

Fitz pushed past her and stormed out of the room.

"What was that about?" she asked but Ward just shrugged and sat silently back down, resuming his position next to Skye.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed the first chapter, please comment, leave kudos etc.!


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